''The loss from Bulgaria's delayed membership in the Eurozone and Schengen is between 4% and 5% of the country's GDP'', Bulgaria’s Minister of Finance Assen Vassilev said in an interview for Nova TV. ''The business loses between EUR 250 million and EUR 500 million just from currency conversion. Separately, delaying eurozone membership leads to higher interest rates and less investment'', Minister Vassilev said.
The losses stemming from Bulgaria’s delayed membership in Schengen are also huge, Minister Vassilev said with regard to the government’s draft decree, according to which Bulgaria should include in an official document the date January 1, 2025, as a target date for adopting the euro. Assen Vassilev said that this act is necessary, because the caretaker cabinet had not written down the date January 1, 2024, as the target date for Eurozone membership, and because it had drafted a budget with a 6.4% deficit.
The preparation of the non-banking financial sector for the introduction of the euro is at a very advanced stage and a significant part of it has already taken concrete measures to adapt to the new currency, the new chairman of the Financial..
The likelihood of Bulgaria joining the eurozone on 1 January 2026 is growing by the day. The country would become the 21st EU member to adopt the single currency. The signals are coming both from the Bulgarian government, which has repeatedly stated..
The Bulgarian National Bank (BNB) has again reduced the key interest rate in the country . As of May 1, it will now be 2.24 percent. The decrease compared to April is 0.15%, when it was 2.39 percent. This is the eighth consecutive month of a decrease in..
According to the Institute for Market Economics , today marks the so-called Tax Freedom Day , reported BNR’s correspondent Natalia Ganchovska...
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