A counterbalance to the decline in interest income for banks due to falling interest rates is expected to come from new lending in 2025, with banks anticipating continued growth in credit expansion for the next financial quarter.
Greek banks, according to information, estimate that their credit expansion will be at much better levels than the previous quarter – which was considered a good start to the year in a traditionally weak period – and clearly at better levels than the corresponding quarter of 2024. The results are expected in late July and early August.
2025 targets
According to the results of the first quarter, however, the credit expansion of the four systemic banks amounted to 3.2 billion euros in total, while for 2025, the targets they have set reach almost 11 billion euros.
Specifically, for the first quarter, National Bank achieved credit expansion of 300 million euros and Alpha Bank 600 million euros, Piraeus 1.1 billion euros, while Eurobank set its credit expansion at 1.2 billion euros. For 2025, according to the banks themselves, Piraeus has set a target of 2.6 billion euros, National Bank and Alpha Bank 2.5 billion euros, while Eurobank has set the bar higher, at 3.5 billion euros.
Given that increased credit expansion is expected for the second quarter of 2025 and two of the four systemic banks have already covered almost half of their target from the first financial quarter – Piraeus has a margin of 1.5 billion euros to cover its target and Eurobank has a margin of 2.3 billion euros – it is not excluded that some will achieve their annual targets from the next quarter.
According to information from “N”, the banks declare themselves optimistic about achieving their annual targets, while they do not rule out the possibility of reaching their targets as early as the second quarter of the year and therefore we can expect an upward revision of their annual targets in the coming period.
