| The annual growth of consumer loans slowed down to 52% in August, after reaching an almost 80% peak in February. Consumer financing reached 68.5 billion RON (equivalent to 19 billion euros) at the end of the summer. In fact, from February to August, the growth rate saw a constant slowdown amid an unfavourable base effect. In August, the volume of consumer funding climbed by 2.6%, close to the monthly average recorded since the beginning of 2008. The advance was, however, much more modest than the one recorded in August 2007, when the credit climbed almost 8%. "August saw some of the credits outsourced, so they no longer feature in local banks' balance sheets, hence the apparent slowdown," says Dan Bucsa, head of the research department of Bancpost. |