BULGARIANS RANKED AS TOP SAVERS IN CEE

Bulgarians are the top savers in Central and Eastern Europe, CEE, according to an analysis prepared by the economic experts of Unicredit Bank.

The report was presented at the annual meeting of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, EBRD, held in Astana, Kazakhstan.

According to the research, in 2010, the average savings norm (the difference between income and consumption) in Bulgaria has been nearly 6% from the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) ranking Bulgaria first among all other analyzed countries – Hungary, Romania, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovenia, Russia and Kazakhstan.

Slovenians and Hungarians were the top spenders with a 0 average savings norm.

The report further shows that Bulgarians enjoy one of the highest annual increases of monthly wages – in 2010 salaries went up 4%. This ranking is led by Kazakhstan with 7%, followed by Russia with 5%. Romania (-4%) and Hungary (-3.5%) are at the other end of the ranking.

Overall results show that households in the region prefer saving instead ofspending, leading to a 20% annual increase of their financial assets while their debt is up 17%, but the latter varies greatly for different countries.