By Andrea Hargraves 
Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the leader of the Law and Justice (PiS) party that has ruled Poland since 2015, on Saturday threatened banks operating in the country with a tax if they did not speed up the rise in interest rates they offer on deposits. However, the party leader did not explain how this additional tax would be applied.
The Polish government has criticized the reluctance of Polish banks to increase the interest paid to depositors, at a time when Poles are facing increasing difficulties in repaying their loans in an inflation scenario.
Criticism of Polish banks stems from the fact that they are not following the key rate increases of the National Bank of Poland, which has started a strong cycle of rate increases – the last increase of 75 basis points was implemented on June 8 – up to the current 6%. Polish interest rates were at an all-time low of 0.1% in September last year, after being raised to 0.5% in October. Since then, Poland’s central bank has raised interest rates at a monthly pace.
“Banks should come to their senses and drastically raise interest rates on deposits,” Kaczynski said. “Otherwise, we will have to tax these additional profits,” he threatened.
BCP is located in Poland through Millennium Bank, in which it holds a controlling stake. In fact, the country’s business penalized the accounts of the financial institution led by Miguel Maya due to the provisions regarding old credits in Swiss francs.