Efforts to strengthen balance sheets must therefore continue in an orderly but resolute fashion, especially by smaller banks, whose NPL ratios are higher and coverage ratios lower than those of the significant banking groups.
The improvement in the quality of banks’ assets was facilitated by the development of the market for NPLs: in the three years 2016-18, NPL disposals amounted to more than € billion, gross of provisions; so far this year they came to around € billion.