Of Chrysostom Chufi

4th reduction of interest rates from ECB Since June 2023, the main interest rate of 4% last summer is 2.75% today. These reductions lead to cheaper lending of households and businesses.

A new housing loan of € 100,000 with a repayment horizon of 30 years – based on the 3 -month Euribor that follows the ECB’s main interest rate and 2.4% profit margin – June had a dose of 601 €. It will now have 544 € – a benefit of 57 €/month.

At the same time – as we wrote about a month ago and after the 3rd Reduction of interest rates from the ECB – there is also time to reduce the interest rates of old mortgages that had been disbursed until December 31, 20222. These loans It is about 422,000 households, frozen since May 2023 at the initiative of banks to protect borrowers from repeated interest rates.

Bank executives said at that reducing interest rates on Thursday by the ECB does not mean bank interest rates on Friday. The process of esteem lasts 3 months, so in theory the first reductions should be perceived by borrowers in March.

Let’s get such an old housing loan of 100,000 € with a repayment horizon of 25 years that has freely frozen at a Euribor rate of 2.85% + 2.5% profit margin = 5.35%. That is, its dose is stuck at € 615 from May 2023.
Normally its interest rate should be 2.61%+2.5 profit margin = 5.11% and therefore its dose has fallen to € 592

All of the above, of course, applies provided that banks will pass the reductions as such. And the figures do not allow the same optimism for all types of loans. For example From June to October 2024, 2 interest rates have been made in a total of half a unit which did not pass at all or passed part of the interest rates of new lending. For example And according to the Bank of Greece’s data and the table below the reductions were also passed on with the above on mortgages and business loans, partly in business while in consumer interest rates had increased !!!! :

Loan June 2024 November 2024

Mortgage 5.41% 4.81%
Business 6.61% 5.95%
Professional 7.55% 7.36%
Consumer 14.92% 15.02%

At the same time, confusion and mistrust seems to be among consumers regarding whether banks are applying the reductions in supplies that the government voted a month ago.

Listener of his radio Furious He phoned to complain that he made electronically to his daughter and while the transaction proof says a charge of $ 1 as the new supplies provide from his account – and without another transaction – committed 3.5 €. When he addressed his bank, the answer he got was “This is a systemic mistake and we will investigate it.”

The complaints are too many like Mr. M who in his mail on January 20 informed us that:

Good morning and good week. I would like to inform you that today I paid PPC account via EIB mobile and the commission is 60 minutes, as was the case before.

The devil is sometimes hidden in the details as new supplies have come into force on January 21. If Mr M had paid the bill a day later he would escape the commission

Another viewer, Mr. K. from Crete informed us that:

In Heraklion, Crete, in the bridge outside the Mantis store has an ATM. Yesterday I went to take over with a pancreas bank card
This machine owned by Alfa Bank and kept me a commission of 1.80 €

This is a confusion as the resetting of the supply of money from another bank from another bank than the consumer applies to municipal units where there is only one bank. It is obvious that in Heraklion there are ATMs of all banks.
If Mr K, he had not taken up but only a question of the rest, then the bank would not be charged with commission.

The changes to the commissions as voted on the House are as follows:

  • Zero charge for paying bills and debts to the State, insurance funds, local government agencies and other general government bodies, decentralized administrations, electricity, gas, water, telecommunications and insurance companies, Mobile – Banking.
  • Maximum charge of 0.5 € for shipping money (outgoing remittance) and € 0.5 for money (incoming transfer), for amounts of up to € 5,000 per remittance, for natural persons and freelancers, between banks within Greece.
  • Midal charge to take cash in municipal units where there is only an ATM of one banking institution
  • Zero charge for balance question to each other Bank’s ATMs across the country
  • Zero charge for charging up to 100 € prepaid cards
  • Extension of 50% of POS purchases to the so -called “small retail” from 10 € through € 20 € to 20 €