Central Bank of Cyprus has issued a directive imposing stricter loan origination criteria both in the commercial banks and the cooperative credit institutions. Under the directive, "the most important criterion which the credit institutions should consider, when assessing an application for granting a facility, is the customer’s income and source of repayment and eventually customer’s

Unemployment in Cyprus declined marginally by 0.77% in November 2013 compared with the previous month, figures released Wednesday by the Cyprus Statistical Service show. According to CyStat, unemployed persons, registered at the District Labour Offices at the end of November 2013, reached 49.334 persons. On the basis of seasonally adjusted data that shows the trend

A second estimate for the third quarter of 2013 published Wednesday by Eurostat confirmed that growth rates in Cyprus have declined. The estimate indicated that the GDP rose by 0.1% in the euro area. Among Member States for which data are available for the third quarter of 2013, Romania (+1.6%) and Latvia (+1.2%) recorded the

British regulators have shut down 100 accounts in the Bank of Cyprus UK subsidiary that were considered as high risk accounts, according to Central Bank governor Panicos Demetriades, with a leading opposition deputy saying the number could be as high as 130. Demetriades told MPs during a meeting of the House Ways and Means Committee

Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) reach 140 countries – including Cyprus- with over 20,000 activities and 10 million participants. The first annual GEW Cyprus, themed «Game Changers, Generation WE» take place between 18-30 November in Athens and include a networking event in Nicosia. GEW is the largest celebration worldwide of the entrepreneurial community, who launch startups

An international survey on student assessment in 65 countries has found that 15 year olds in Cyprus ranked at the bottom of the list in reading skills, maths and science. The OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), presented in Brussels jointly with the European Commission, showed that the EU as a whole is seriously

The fourth edition of the World Giving Index, which looks at charitable behaviour across 135 countries, ranks Cyprus in 24th place based on three measures of giving behaviour – the percentage of people who, in a typical month, donate money to charity, volunteer their time, and help a stranger. Cyprus was 37th in helping a

Tightening of credit standards on loans to enterprises stabilised in the third quarter, while demand for loans by households and enterprises was lower compared with the previous quarter, the Central Bank of Cyprus said in its October Banking Lending Survey (BLS). The net percentage of banks reporting a tightening of credit standards on loans was

 * €1.5 bln to be used for funds from ECB * The island’s Cooperative credit societies will soon operate as a unified banking group, following a bailout programme and a set reforms that are restructuring the community based savings banks into a commercial entity. The President of the Cooperative Central Bank (CCB) Council Nicolas Hadjiyiannis

The government and the private sector are drafting an action plan to reverse the negative climate surrounding Cyprus on taxation transparency, following the reent unfavourable report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). President Nicos Anastasiades hosted a meeting with the participation of representatives from the Ministry of Finance, the Inland Revenue Department,