Meeting held with the IMF representatives

22/02/2019

The Governor of the Central Bank, Radoje Žugić, with his team has had a meeting today with the representatives of the International Monetary Fund for Montenegro. The IMF visited Montenegro on the occasion of handing over the duty of the IMF Mission Chief, Martin Petri, to new Mission Chief, Srikant Seshadri.

The Governor Žugić thanked Mr Petri for the cooperation that they have had so far and congratulated Mr Seshadri on his appointment, expressing the expectations that the Central Bank of Montenegro and the IMF will continue the successful and fruitful cooperation in the future.

The current macroeconomic developments and the situation in the banking sector were discussed at the meeting. 

The Governor informed the IMF representatives that the operations of banks in Montenegro are stable and they are characterised by high liquidity and adequate capitalisation. He added that the positive trends of all key balance sheet positions at the system level have continued also in 2019. Thus, at end-January 2019, banks’ assets grew y-o-y by 6.4%, as well as lending activity, which increased by 10.2%, deposits increased by 5.6%, capital by 7.1% and profit by 5.4%.

The Governor announced that the Central Bank, in accordance with the IMF recommendations, will soon start the asset quality review of all banks and it will be performed by independent audit firms.