AFTER THE BANK PROPOSED THE CONVERSION OF A LOAN AT A HIGHER EXCHANGE RATE THAN THE ONE IT PRACTICED Isărescu: "The offer made by Bancpost is an aberration, I hope it will be a one-off case"

The offer made by Bancpost is an aberration, says governor Mugur Isărescu, speaking about the conversion proposal made by the bank to a CHF borrower, which would have made the conversion at an exchange rate of 4.52 lei/CHF, while the regular exchange rate for selling CHF was 4.22 lei/CHF on the day the offer was made.

"I don't know the case, but if it is, I hope it's a one off, it is an aberration", the head of the NBR said, answering the question that was addressed to him by BURSA.

Essentially, the bank was asking the borrower to pay 13,000 lei more than the loan is currently worth, as demonstrated by offer of the bank, which the customer sent us.

The borrower also told us that after reviewing their loan agreement, the National Consumer Protection Authority (ANPC), found it included clauses which it considered abusive.

The ANPC recently won the first class action lawsuit against OTP Bank.

Speaking about the OTP lawsuit, governor Mugur Isărescu thinks that if the court of law finds abusive clauses in certain contracts and if the ruling is final, then it must be enforced.

"Under no circumstances does the NBR protect any bank that uses abusive clauses. According to the law, if a ruling is definitive, then that that's how it is".

As for the burden of CHF loans, the governor says that banks should negotiate with their customers a solution that would lead to the sharing of the burden: "I have constantly advised them (ed. note: bankers) to try a negotiation with borrowers. I have always pleaded for sharing the load. You don't know how often times I've spoken out in support of that".

The governor's message addressed yesterday to banks is not the first, even as, for more than six months now, not one of the banks that have outstanding CHF loans, except for Banca Transilvania, which acquired Volksbank, has promoted a program that would help all these debtors.

Most of the borrowers that took out loans denominated in CHF are unable to make their monthly loan repayments, after the Swiss currency unexpectedly strengthened in January, when the Swiss Central Bank lifted the 1.2 CHF/EUR peg, which it had imposed in 2011.