By Kjetil Malkenes Hovland
OSLO--Norway's Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday that
new capital requirement for domestic lenders could be presented as
early as the spring, but industry figures warned him not to hurt
the country's international competitiveness by introducing stricter
rules than those in other countries.
"The rules we are presenting in the near future will be
reasonable, contribute to solid banks, be implemented gradually and
will also take into consideration what other countries are doing,"
Mr. Stoltenberg told reporters on the sidelines of the Finance
Norway conference.
Mr. Stoltenberg didn't give an exact date for the legislation to
be presented to parliament, but said Norway was seeking to avoid
the mistakes it made in the run up to its banking crisis in the
1990s, and those made by other countries during the recent
financial crisis.
In the wake of the financial crisis the Basel Committee, an
international banking supervisory body, drew up the Basel III
regulatory framework which requires banks to hold more high-quality
capital to absorb any potential losses. But senior figures in the
Norwegian finance industry have warned that stricter capital
requirements in Norway could harm the overall economy.
Helge Leiro Baastad, chairman of Finance Norway and chief
executive of insurance company Gjensidige Forsikring ASA (GJF.OS),
said in a speech at the conference that stricter rules would hurt
the financial sector and also hurt businesses by reducing lending
to small and medium-sized companies.
Mr. Stoltenberg criticized the recent decision by a number of
domestic banks, including Norway's biggest bank DNB ASA (DNB.OS),
to increase lending rates on the expectations of higher capital
requirements. Mr. Stoltenberg didn't single out any of the banks,
but said the decision came too early.
"It is not possible to increase lending rates today based on
rules that the government has not yet presented," he said.
Write to Kjetil Malkenes Hovland at
kjetilmalkenes.hovland@dowjones.com