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Sberbank of Russia eliminating bubble risks

The consumer loan approval rates have fallen from 70% at the beginning of 2013 to 62% toward the end of the year

© ITAR-TASS/Mitya Aleshkovsky

LONDON, November 21. /ITAR-TASS/. Russia's largest retail savings bank Sberbank is tightening the terms for retail loans, its chief executive German Gref told the British international business and economics newspaper Financial Times in an interview published on Thursday.

The consumer loan approval rates have fallen from 70% at the beginning of 2013 to 62% toward the end of the year. The lending conditions are much stricter, the newspaper quoted Gref as saying.

The bank’s chief executive added there were risks of a financial bubble on the Russian retail loan market in 2014, so the bank was already prepared for such developments.

“In 2012, our goal was to increase the presence of our assets on the market, now our main target is the quality of assets,” Gref concluded.

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