Overall private credit rose by just 25.8% in 2008 in real terms, half the rise recorded in 2007, when it had leapt by over 50%, as a result of the sudden decline of the last two months. "It is an abrupt decline. The normal thing would be for the NBR (National Bank of Romania) to abandon its wait-and-see attitude, because enough data are there to justify at least one of the two possible steps - an interest rate cut or a reduction in the reserve required ratio. Romania has not reached the level where its economy can function normally with a one-digit rise in lending," said Lucian Anghel, chief-economist of the BCR, the largest bank on the Romanian market. At the end of last year, credits granted by banks to the private sector reached a sum equivalent to 49.7 billion euros, with 58% accounting for funding granted in foreign currency.
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