Deposits drop after ENFIA
by Evgenia Tzortzi, ekathimerini.com, 26 November 2015

The bank deposits of households and corporations in Greece declined by 681 million euros in October. In total they fell from 121.8 billion in September to 121.1 billion euros last month.

The drop, which was recorded in spite of the capital controls that restrict withdrawals, is attributed to tax obligations that taxpayers were forced to cover in October, particularly the first installment of the Single Property Tax (ENFIA).

According to Bank of Greece data released on Thursday, Greek households withdrew a net amount of 533 million euros from their accounts, taking their balance to 101.2 billion euros, against 101.7 billion euros in September. A significant amount was moved out of time deposits, whose balance declined by 936.1 million euros within one month, as a number of households chose to access their time deposits early and move their savings into other accounts.

Enterprises' access to ready cash declined by 135.6 million euros, taking their total liquidity to 19.8 billion euros. Including the deposits of overseas-based bank customers as well as the general government sector, total deposits held in the local credit system shrank by 838 million euros in October.

Meanwhile, private sector funding continued to fall, as the net flow of loans was negative by 412 million euros.