ATHENS: Greece's top four banks have raised over 5.0 billion euros ($5.3 billion) in private funds, officials said Monday, which together with EU funds should be enough to meet their recapitalisation needs so they can support the country's struggling economy.
"The attraction of over five billion in private capital shows that confidence is returning in the prospects of the Greek economy and the domestic banking system," a government source said.
Burdened by non-performing loans and constrained by capital controls imposed in June, Greek banks had been living under the threat of having their assets seized, like their Cyprus counterparts in 2013.
Under orders by the European Central Bank to raise private capital to receive an injection up to 10 billion euros of EU bailout funds, the nation's top four banks began soliciting investors at the beginning of the month.
National Bank, Piraeus Bank, Alpha Bank and Eurobank were instructed by the ECB to bolster their capital buffers by at least 4.4 billion and to 14.4 billion euros to survive potential economic shocks.
There was urgency to complete the process of raising private capital before the end of the year, when new European bank rescue regulations could have seen part of deposits seized.
Eurozone finance ministers approved on Monday a 2 billion euro payment to Greece under its bailout programme after the government undertook a number of measures, which were also a precondition for releasing the 10 billion euros in recapitalisation funds.
Bank shares have taken a sustained beating over the past year, losing over 90 percent of their value.
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