The Left Bloc presented a bill this Tuesday that would increase the contribution to the banking sector, arguing that this is a fair measure at a time when banks are making “astronomical profits”.
In a press conference at the Assembly of the Republic, the deputy of the leftist bloc Mariana Mortágua underlined that Portuguese banks “have achieved record profits over the past year, and in particular this quarter”.
“This is not exactly the result of an increase in banks’ efficiency, of an improvement in services. (…) Banks only benefit from interest rate hikes, which are decided by the European Central Bank (ECB),” he said. .
Mariana Mortágua believed that precisely this increase in interest rates “disadvantages those who have mortgage loans” and regretted that the banks did not translate this increase into demand and term deposits.
“When it’s time to receive, banks want to receive. When it’s time to pay, banks refuse to pay depositors rate hikes equal to what they charge on loans,” he criticized.
In this regard, the deputy of the bloquista underlined the need to increase the contribution to the banking sector, pointing out that it has not been updated since 2016 and that it “is channeled to the resolution fund so that it returns all the money that taxpayers have returned to the state “. loaned to bail out several banks of the Portuguese system”.
“In this day and age, when banks are making extraordinary, astronomical profits that come directly from the efforts of people paying their home loans, it is only fair that the contribution to the banking industry is increasing and that banks are taking part of their money. the state lent them in the past,” he stressed.
Mariana Mortágua said that in practice the contribution to the banking sector is focused on “balance sheet variables” and its practical application “is determined by the Bank of Portugal through a regulation”.
“What we are doing is increasing the range of the rates, both the minimum and the maximum. It is for the Bank of Portugal to define concretely, in accordance with the balance sheet situation of the Portuguese banks, how to apply this rate,” he said.
In the bill, BE therefore proposes that the rate for liabilities calculated and approved by taxpayers that are deducted from core and ancillary equity be between 0.03% and 0.2%, while the rate on the notional value of derivative financial instruments off-balance sheet instruments calculated by taxpayers would be between 0.003% and 0.001%.
Mariana Mortágua argued that an increase in this contribution could be used “to support people who have difficulty paying their home loan”, either by taking “more robust measures”, or by ensuring that banks use tax revenues to pay the subsidized pay interest currently borne by taxpayers.
“Regardless of the proposals being made on home loans, I think it is fair, taking into account the increase in bank profits, to ask or oblige banks to contribute in a larger proportion as well,” he stressed.
When asked if the BE, like the president of the republic, also hopes that the banks will wake up from the housing loan problem, the BE deputy replied that Portugal has a “prime minister who has the good faith of supermarkets and hypermarkets to raise the prices of essential goods” and a head of state “who counts on the good faith of the banks not to squeeze people out of their home loans”.
“I think it’s time to put an end to showing hope and goodwill. (…) More than wishing or waiting, it’s important to take concrete measures, it’s not asking banks to think about it again to negotiate credits, let alone thank the bank that has already renegotiated credits. It imposes on the bank that it contributes to society,” he said.
This bill will be discussed next Thursday in the Assembly of the Republic, in a mandatory debate scheduled by Chega on the banking system, home loans and “bank casualties”.
Source: DN
