In March, the total amount of outstanding loans fell by €156m to €48.7bn mainly on loan repayments made by other financial intermediaries, the central bank said in a statement on its website on Friday.

In March, total net loan repayments made by other financial intermediaries amounted to €111.9m, reducing their overall debts to €7.9bn, the bank supervisor said. Households repaid €63.3m against their loans, which fell to €20.8bn. Banks extended €21.3m in fresh lending to non-financial corporations while the general government’s total debt to domestic commercial banks fell by €2.2bn to €750.5m.

Other financial intermediaries were responsible for €208.7m in total withdrawals in March followed by households, which saw their deposits drop by €183.9m, the largest reduction since September 2014, to €28.5bn, the central bank said. Households resident on the island reduced their deposits by €199.9m to €23.3bn, which is also the largest amount withdrawn by Cypriot households since September 2014 and may be related to fears over the solvency of the Cyprus Cooperative Bank which prompted the government last month to issue €2.35bn in bonds in favour of the state-owned lender and deposit €2.5bn in cash there.

Deposits held by non-financial corporations fell by €83.8m to €11bn while the government’s deposits dropped by €112.1m to €818.4m, the central bank said. In addition, the amount of funds held by insurance and pension funds at banks fell by €54.4m to below €1.9bn.

In its March balance sheet published on April 26, the Central Bank of Cyprus said that claims on euro area credit institutions rose to €393,000, from €6,000 the month before. This category of claims included in the past the emergency liquidity extended to Cyprus Popular Bank, widely known as Laiki, which Bank of Cyprus inherited five years ago.

Source: Cyprus Mail