YEREVAN, July 1. /ARKA/. Nonperforming loans made up 9.1% of Armenian banks’ aggregate loan portfolio in late April 2015 after growing 0.8 percentage points over one month.

According to the central bank’s figures, in April 2014 the share of nonperforming loans in the aggregate loan portfolio was 6.1%.

The share of nonperforming loans in the country’s banking sector was growing throughout the entire 2014.

The growth speeded up in the second half of 2014, and in December the share increased to 7% amid financial shocks triggered by devaluation of the national currency.

In January 2015 it reached 8.4% and in February 8.95, but in March it reduced to 8.3%.
The regulator says the previous increase in nonperforming loans was seen in 2009 amid the global recession.

Analysts say borrowers fail to fulfill their obligations toward banks, and this is the banks’ biggest trouble. Small and mid-size companies dominate the risky zone.

Analysts point out the current difficult economic situation in Armenia as one of the factors of increase of the number of insolvent borrowers. ----0---