Saulius Abraskevicius, spokesman for Swedbank Lithuania, told the daily that the bank did not plan to pass negative deposit rates to its business or private customers and did not consider such an option.
Giedre Geciauskiene, head of financial markets at Danske Bank Lithuania, also said that the bank did not consider charging its private customers for deposits.
Meanwhile, SEB Bankas, whose representative told the Latvian media about concerns about negative deposit rates, told the Lietuvos Zinios that it could not predict potential changes in the deposit market.
Still, Marius Dubnikovas, chairman of the Tax Commission of the Lithuanian Business Confederation (LVK) told the daily that banks were commercial institutions, which represented the interests of their shareholders and could not pay for deposits, which they could not "put to work". Therefore, in his view, banks would have no other choice but to levy negative interest rates.
