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The Bank of Cyprus CEO John-Patrick Hourican on Wednesday urged the business community in Cyprus to increase the legal and political pressure to move towards a faster solution to the issue of non-performing loans (NPLs).

In his closing remarks at the Business Leaders Summit 2018 in Nicosia, Hourican stressed that tolerance of NPLs remains a major hurdle. He also said that of €7bn in troubled loans only one-third concerned truly vulnerable borrowers, but this was causing too much protection for the whole.

“We need to move beyond that,” he said. “Tackling that now leaves us in control of our destiny.”

Hourican also drew attention to the challenges faced by democracies, saying that Cyprus must be alert because it is in a vulnerable region.

He also referred to recent diplomatic incidents in relation to the recent murder attempts on a spy and his daughter in the UK and said that Cyprus should be alert because of the association the country had with Russia.

“It feels to me like the world is just getting a little more dangerous in rhetoric and indeed dangerous actually. We need to be alert to that in Cyprus because we rely on the expression of our safety as a place to come, to ensure our continued economic success,” Hourican said.
During the event, top business executives in Cyprus shared their experiences and talked about the future challenges they face.

Source: CyprusMail