Skopje, 18 February 2023
The new Law on Financial Stability contributes to further strengthening of the financial stability by formally establishing a Financial Stability Committee, chaired by the Governor of the National Bank, and with representatives from all financial regulators. The Committee is responsible for coordinated monitoring of the situation in the financial system and taking activities to prevent or reduce systemic risks. Currently, the National Bank is preparing a Macro-Prudential Strategy that will regulate in more details the macro-prudential objectives, instruments and indicators for monitoring financial stability, and the Strategy is expected to be adopted by the Committee soon. This was highlighted at a working meeting of the National Bank Governor, Anita Angelovska Bezhoska and the Vice Governor, Fadil Bajrami with the Acting Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy, Christopher Zimmer and Jordan Damchevski, Senior Economist at the Embassy.
At the meeting, the Governor pointed out that last year the National Bank adopted a macro-prudential measure aimed at further strengthening of the capital position of the banking system, by introducing a countercyclical capital buffer of 0.5%. At the beginning of this year, an additional requirement for a countercyclical capital buffer of 0.25% was also introduced. These measures will contribute to further maintaining the high level of capitalization of the banking system, which is currently 17.7%, highest in the last decade. Capitalization is a prerequisite for solid credit support for the economy, which grew by 9.4% last year, with a high growth in corporate sector lending of 11.5%.
Subject matter of the meeting were also the growth prospects of the Macedonian economy, noting that although the IMF's latest forecasts point to improved growth prospects of the EU economy, our major trading partner, the risks in regard to the forecasted path of growth of the domestic economy remain and will depend mainly on the external environment.
At the end, both sides expressed commitment for further and deeper mutual cooperation.
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