Lending to companies for current assets and investments totalled 64.8 billion kuna (€8.8 billion) at the end of April 2018, down 2.4 percent on the year, according to central bank data.

Raiffeisenbank Austria (RBA) analysts said that the drop represented a continuation of negative annual growth rates which lasted since May 2012, except for September 2017.

Compared with March 2018, lending to companies for current assets and investments went up by 0.6 percent. Foreign currency loans, which accounted for 65.8 percent of all loans, increased year-on-year for the tenth month running in April 2018 to over 42.6 billion kuna (€5.8 billion). Kuna-denominated loans to non-financial companies was down 7.5 percent year-on-year to 22.1 billion kuna (€3 billion), falling for the 13th month in a row.

Investment loans at the end of April 2018 totalled 31.2 billion kuna (€4.2 billion), down 1.2 percent on the year, while loans for current assets stood at 33.5 billion kuna (€4.5 billion), down 3.5 percent annually but up by 0.5 percent monthly.

(€1 = 7.37 kuna)

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