“I may say I also bet on fifty-fifty odds since the bankruptcy of Ūkio Bankas, which was somewhat unexpected, has led to an increase in certain risks to us. Although we said that it would have no effects to some extent, we still have to take into consideration that it’s unclear how the European Central Bank (ECB) will count certain lost amounts, such as money paid by the deposit insurance fund to the bank’s depositors,” Butkevičius told the reporters of Lietuvos Ryto Televizija, a TV channel.
Indėlių ir Investicijų Draudimas (Deposit and Investment Insurance), the governmental deposit and investment insurance vehicle, has paid 800 million litas (EUR 231.88m) to the depositors of Ūkio Bankas, which was closed in February.
Late in March, the analysts of Scandinavia’s financial group SEB put the probability of Lithuania’s adopting the euro in 2015 at 50 percent.
Lithuania aimed to switch to the euro in 2007 but was refused entry because its inflation rate was above the Maastricht limit. The country will now seek to join the euro zone in 2015.
