VTB restructures 110 bln rbl retail, 770 bln rbl corporate loans

MOSCOW, Apr 28 (PRIME) -- Russia’s second largest bank VTB has restructured 110 billion rubles of retail loans and 770 billion rubles of corporate loans, hurt by the coronavirus, the bank said in a statement on Tuesday quoting CEO Andrei Kostin.

“In general, if we take individual clients, VTB has 120,000 clients who restructured debts worth about 110 billion rubles. Regarding companies, it amounts to 770 billion rubles, including loans to small and medium-sized businesses of 130 billion rubles,” Kostin said as quoted by the bank.

“Approvals of request for credit holidays from individuals stand at 84.7%, including acceptance of requests on mortgage loans of 91.18% and acceptance of requests on other types of loans of 65.5,” he said.

He also suggested the government create a mechanism for the largest Russian banks to buy additional amounts of sovereign debt.

“I think it would be dangerous to amend the budget to cut spending on the key programs. I think that this should be about sovereign debt in the first place. We can raise the debt by 5–6 trillion rubles. The banks are ready to participate in such programs supported by the central bank. I mean at least VTB Bank and Sberbank,” he said as quoted by the bank.

“I think that we have to support the companies, employment, and wages in the first place. This is the most important task now, we have to ensure that people can work, get paid, and provide for their families after the lockdown ends.”

(74.4960 rubles – U.S. $1)

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