“The latest figures show that over 50% of loans are now with fixed interest, so in a year we may see there was much ado about nothing,” he said, adding a prevalence of fixed-interest loans would thwart the entire debate of ROBOR versus IRCC.
He explained that if inflation rises, three-month ROBOR would be higher than the new index IRCC, though not by much, but if inflation drops, three-month ROBOR is very likely to be lower than IRCC.
Isarescu added the evolution of these indices will be tight and forecasts cannot be very accurate since there are many factors to consider, including liquidity management.
The IRCC, which is defined as the quarterly average of interbank money market transactions, has replaced ROBOR at the beginning of May. At the time of its introduction, the new index was lower than ROBOR by one percentage point.