OREANDA-NEWS. April 01, 2014. Companies took 15% more in loans and leases in February this year than they did a year earlier. The increase was greater for long-term loans, more than half of which went to finance real estate and manufacturing companies.

Increased activity in the housing market was accompanied by an increase in housing loans. More than 15% more new loan contracts were signed in February than a year earlier, while the yearly growth in the turnover of housing loans reached 37%. As the volume of new loans was only slightly larger than the amounts repaid from earlier loans, the growth in the loan stock was modest. The housing loan portfolio was 1.2% larger at the end of February than it was a year ago.

The total stock of loans and leases issued to Estonian companies and households stood at 14.8 billion euros in February, which is 0.8% more than a year ago.

Borrowing has been facilitated by low interest costs. The six-month EURIBOR, which is the base rate for a majority of loans, remained at 0.4% in February, and the average interest margin on new housing loans was 2.1%. The average interest margin on long-term corporate loans was 2.7%, equalling the average for the past two years.

The volume of loans overdue for more than 60 days constituted less than 2% of the total portfolio in the end of February. As the quality of loan portfolio is improving, the banks continued to reduce the provisions made earlier to cover loan losses, and at the end of February provisions covered 75% of the long-term overdue loans.

The deposits of Estonian companies and households grew at an annual rate of 8% in February. Deposits from households and companies in the domestic non-financial sector increased during the month by a total of 128 million euros to reach 9.3 billion euros by the end of the month. The deposits of non-residents increased by 20 million euros in February to 2.3 billion euros, as before accounting for 20% of all the deposits in banks.