State bank CGD receives 30,000 requests for €2.4B of loan moratoria

The CEO of Caixa Geral de Depósitos, Portugal’s state-owned savings bank, said on Wednesday in parliament that the bank has received some 30,000 requests for moratoria on loans totalling 2.4 billion euros, under the terms of Government legislation to offset the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to Paulo Macedo, who was testifying to a joint session of parliament’s budget and finance committee and economy committee, the bank has received more than 20,000 requests for moratoria on home loans, worth 1.4 billion euros, and around 10,000 requests for moratoria on corporate loans, worth about 1 billion euros.

The Caixa CEO added that on top of this there are moratoria made available by CGD itself, but did not indicate the number of requests. He did mention, however, that the bank has a relatively small share of the market for consumer credit, so the moratoria it will give for such operations will be “much smaller” .

Since the end of March, a law has been in force that allows the suspension for six months, from April to September, of payments on home and corporate loans (capital and/or interest).

Last week Portugal’s leading banks agreed moratoriums for consumer credit (which is not covered by the Government legislation) and for home loans, for customers who have seen a drop in income of 20% – a level that the Government’s law does not cover.

The CEO of BCP on Tuesday told deputies that the bank currently has 80,000 moratoria on loans (both public and private), worth a total of 4.5 billion euros.

The CEO of Santander Totta, for his part, indicated that the bank has 70,000 moratoria on credits worth 7.5 billion euros.

Also in Wednesday’s hearing in parliament, the Caixa CEO addressed the issue of Covid-19 credit lines (guaranteed by the state) to support companies, noting that his bank has €4.3 billion in loans approved, in a total of 26,000 operations. He also said that including financing that has been pre-approved, credit lines already opened, and loans already transferred to customers’ accounts, the total amount that Caixa has made available to companies amounts to 10.7 billion euros.

On Tuesday, BCP said it has 4.3 billion euros available for companies under Covid-19 credit lines, and Santander Totta said that it has approved 2 billion euros.

This week deputies are hearing the CEOs of leading banks on measures in the sector to support families and companies, and in particular on any difficulties presented by the banks in lending money to companies that are badly affected by the Covid-19 crisis.

The CEO of Novo Banco, António Ramalho, was also to be heard on Wednesday.