Polish banks could face rocky year ahead

[unhappycamper]

http://www.dw.com/en/polish-banks-could-face-rocky-year-ahead/a-19111693

Poland’s banking system is doing fine, the sector’s authorities say. But concerns are growing that fiscal pressures may accentuate systemic problems in 2016.

Polish banks could face rocky year ahead
Jo Harper
12.03.2016

The head of the country's financial watchdog (KNF), Andrzej Jakubiak, recently sought to head off concerns that the Polish banking sector would be facing difficult times ahead. He told reporters in Warsaw recently that the system was “stable and money held in Polish banks safe.”

But the recent sacking of Deputy Finance Minister Konrad Raczkowski for saying some small Polish banks could go bust in the near future raised some eyebrows. “Several smaller banks are toxic and they will go bankrupt later this year,” Raczkowski said.

Poland's banking system is about 70 percent foreign-owned and was well capitalized during the 2008-2010 international financial crisis, emerging largely unscathed from it. But a combination of ongoing deflation and political uncertainties could combine to tarnish its largely unblemished reputation.

The new right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) government has sought various means since taking office last November to fund its ambitious – read expensive – social programs. And the banks are in the firing line.