Expert-Grup

Reforms in the Financial and Banking Sector Have Begun, but Are Progressing Slowly

Tuesday, 29 March 201651760 views
Reforms in the Financial and Banking Sector Have Begun, but Are Progressing Slowly

Automatically translated summary. The full article is available in Romanian.

The Independent Think Tank “Expert-Grup” in Chișinău has monitored the latest actions in Moldova's financial and banking sector. It found greater activity by the authorities and the donor community since February 2016, but concluded that reforms with real impact are advancing very slowly and remain insufficient.

The monitoring covered four actions: the financial-banking package adopted by Parliament on 25 February 2016, the draft Roadmap on priority reforms adopted the same day, the competition to select the Governor of the National Bank of Moldova (February-March 2016) and technical assistance. Experts say the measures cannot resolve the banking crisis or prevent similar ones.

Gaps include unfilled leadership posts at the National Bank of Moldova and CNPF, opaque bank ownership, a fragmented financial stability framework, weak independence of both institutions, exposure to off-shore entities, deficient bank resolution and an unreformed deposit guarantee system. Priorities are stronger central bank independence, tighter supervision, shareholder transparency and “de-offshorisation”. Executive director Adrian Lupușor called for faster efforts focused on systemic measures. The study was supported by the Embassy of the Netherlands in Bucharest.

View the original article in Romanian