At the end of 2018, there were 323,758 Croatians with bank accounts blocked due to unpaid debts, owing a total of 43.81 billion kuna (€5.9 billion). In addition, there were more than 23,000 businesses owing around 12.29 billion kuna (€1.7 billion), according to the most recent data released by the state's Financial Agency on Monday.

The data showed that the number of people with blocked bank accounts decreased monthly and annually, although their total debt continued to increase. In spite of their number falling by 2,621 monthly, and by 1,251 year-on-year, their total debt went up 0.4 percent monthly and 3.8 percent annually.

By type of debt, the largest number of citizens owed money to telecoms (160,000), while the bulk of the value of their debt – some 17.7 billion kuna (€2.4 billion) – was owed to banks. They owed the entire financial sector around 20.5 billion kuna (€2.8 billion), or 46.9 percent of the total debt.

Earlier on Monday, Prime Minister Plenkovic announced that the new set of regulations which came into force on Saturday would write off debts of some 150,000 Croatians owed to various state institutions and state-owned companies.

As for businesses, the number of companies with blocked accounts decreased by 1.8 percent month-on-month, and their total debt by 2.7 percent. Annually, the number of businesses with blocked bank accounts dropped by 13.6 percent, and their total debt by 21.7 percent, or by 3.41 billion kuna.

Around two thirds of those businesses had their bank accounts frozen for more than a year, and they owed 9.75 billion kuna (79.4 percent of the total debt), while nearly 4,000 businesses had their accounts blocked up to 120 days, owing 1.1 billion kuna in total.

(€1 = 7.39 kuna)

Follow N1 via mobile apps for Android | iPhone/iPad | Windows| and social media on Twitter | Facebook.