Central Bank prepared to make forex mortgages "prohibitive" for banks - Nabiullina
MOSCOW. Jan 30 (Interfax) - The Russian Central Bank is prepared to raise the risk factors for foreign currency mortgages in order to make the mortgages "prohibitive" for banks, Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina told the State Duma on Friday.
"The Russian Central Bank has already taken measures to discourage banks from issuing forex mortgages. Now it's 50% more expensive for banks to issue a forex mortgage than ruble-denominated one, as concerns capital. We are prepared to raise this coefficient event further in order for forex mortgages to be practically prohibitive," she said.
Support for borrowers who took out forex mortgages should only be provided with consideration given to their income. In the future, the Central Bank is prepared to take measure ensuring that forex mortgages become prohibitive for banks, Nabiullina said.
The Central Bank is not against legally banning forex mortgages, but the bank does not consider this a currency control measure, she told journalists on Friday.
"We are not against this becoming a law. We'll look at what kind of law this will be. But we can do this with our own coefficients [risk ratios]," Nabiullina said, adding that these would restrict forex mortgages.
"But these are not foreign exchange controls. This is simply a ban on issuing foreign currency mortgages to the public. This isn't entirely forex control in the classical sense, but yes - it's a ban in light of the fact that people's lack of financial literacy makes them unable to assess future currency risks," she added.
