FX loans fee refund, property handover would be legal: Polish presidential aide

[May 10, 2016]  By Pawel Florkiewicz and Marcin Goclowski

WARSAW (Reuters) - Proposals allowing Polish borrowers to claim back currency conversion fees on their Swiss-franc mortgages and walk away from the loans in exchange for handing back the properties involved would be legal, a presidential aide said on Tuesday.

Poland's eurosceptic Law and Justice party (PiS) swept to power last year partly on a promise to help thousands of Poles who took out loans in Swiss francs when the franc was cheaper against the zloty, only to see their loan costs soar after the franc's value surged when its peg against the euro was scrapped.

More than 500,000 Polish home-buyers took out Swiss franc loans, and the skyrocketing Swiss currency made many of mortgages worth more than the corresponding properties.

President Andrzej Duda proposed in January converting the loans to zlotys and making banks pay for the conversion. But the financial watchdog KNF poured cold water on the proposal, saying it would trigger exorbitant costs of $17 billion.

Some analysts also said it would legally difficult, if not impossible, to re-denominate the transactions.

Last week, sources close to the matter told Reuters that authorities were considering abandoning a forced conversion of the mortgages in favor of laws allowing borrowers to obtain refunds on currency conversion costs - so-called spreads - or free themselves of the loan by relinquishing the property.

The two proposed solutions are feasible and legally doable, according to Marcin Dyl, a member of a presidential panel tasked with finding a solution to the issue of Swiss franc mortgages.

"The (proposed) ability to hand the keys over is realistic. It could be implemented, but in such a way as to control the supply of properties," Dyl told Reuters in an interview, adding that an unrestrained flow could damage the real estate market. Real estate funds could manage the properties, he said.

"But the most important thing is to allow (the borrower) to live in the flat as a tenant. Or to grant him a pre-emption right to buy the flat," Dyl said.

Under such a scheme, banks who receive flats in exchange for debt abolition would need to re-value them and create write-downs. Former owners could then buy them back at a market price.

This solution would make banks assess the real estate value they are granting credits for more accurately in future, Dyl said.

The heightened currency conversion charges imposed on Swiss-franc mortgage holders could be seen as illegal and so subject to reimbursement, said Dyl, a lawyer and former head of the law department in Poland's financial regulatory body.

Borrowers' mortgage installments could be reduced to reflect previous overcharges, he added.

The presidential panel aims to announce a plan to resolve the Swiss franc mortgage problem by the end of May.

Polish banks hold foreign currency mortgage portfolios totaling 148 billion zlotys ($38.07 billion).

(Reporting by Marcin Goclowski and Pawel Florkiewicz; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

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