According to the ECB, each bank is entitled to make use of any tools at their disposal to bring down their exposure to NPLs.

An annual ECB report on Supervised Activities for 2018, reports that banks registered in Greece, Cyprus and Portugal recorded the highest NPE, with rates of 43.4%, 20.7% and 14.5% respectively, in the third quarter of 2018.

According to the report, the Cyprus banks NPL ratio declined significantly on an annual basis by 13.3%, Slovenia’s banks by 5.3%, Irish banks by 3.7%, Portuguese banks by 3.6%, and banks in Greece reduced their NPE by 3.2%.

In Q3 2018, Italy’s banks had the largest non-performing loan portfolio worth €153 billion followed by French banks with a €130 billion portfolio, while Spanish banks had a portfolio worth €95 billion and Greek credit institutions had €90 billion worth of non-performing exposure.

The ECB has developed a supervisory framework for non-performing loans, which includes three strategic elements, which are either directly addressed to old-style non-performing loans or are intended to prevent the creation of new non-performing loans in the future.

Source: Financial Mirror