Economics
Swiss Franc Surge Loses Bite for East Europe: Chart of the Day
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East Europe’s economies will be rocked less by the Swiss franc’s surge after authorities and households learned the lessons from a similar spike in 2011, shying away from the currency as economies strengthened.
The CHART OF THE DAY shows eastern European household loans denominated in francs as a proportion of gross domestic product shrank from 2011, when Switzerland capped the currency after it soared 17 percent. In Hungary, the share of franc-denominated loans has fallen by almost half to about 10 percent of GDP, and will fall further when requirements for banks to convert the loans into forint take effect on Feb. 1.