The Croatian government on Wednesday forwarded to Parliament a bill on interest rates putting the maximum allowed contractual interest rate in contracts between businesses at 12.25% and the maximum interest rate in contracts with households at 11.35%.
Finance Minister Slavko Linic said that this was significantly less than the current maximum contractual interest rate of 18% allowed by the Contractual Relations Act.
He added that bankers were not satisfied with the government's bill because it put the maximum allowed interest rate on current account overdrafts at 10.35%, instead of the current rate of 11%, but the government's primary concern was to protect citizens.
The government also proposed a single reference rate for the maximum default interest, which in contractual relations between businesses would be increased by 8% and in other relations by 7%.
This would align the corporate default interest rate with the calculation in the Financial Operations and Pre-Bankruptcy Settlement Act, which is 12.35%. Under the Contractual Relations Act, the default interest rate stands at 15%.
Under the government's bill, businesses may agree among themselves a different default interest rate, but it may not exceed the legally prescribed default interest rate increased by half that rate. In other contractual relations, the default interest rate will be 11.35%, while under the Act on Contractual Relations it was 12%.
(Hina)
News
