NBS Lower-Rate Loan Program for 100,000 Dinars Ends Tuesday

The National Bank of Serbia (NBS) program that lets employees and pensioners earning up to 100,000 dinars a month take out loans at lower interest rates ends on Tuesday, September 15, exactly one year after it took effect.

The terms applied to dinar-denominated loans for borrowers earning up to 100,000 dinars a month, or more if an individual bank’s own business decision allowed it. The upper limit on loan amounts in certain categories was 1,000,000 RSD (about 8,525 EUR). Four types of loans were covered:

• dinar consumer and cash loans up to 1,000,000 RSD
• dinar loans for refinancing existing cash and consumer loans, with no cap on the amount
• special cash loans up to 1,000,000 RSD and refinancing loans approved for pensioners with life insurance included
• home loans for the purchase of a first property

Banks were required to cut the nominal interest rate on dinar cash and consumer loans up to one million dinars by at least three percentage points compared with the average rates from July 2025, with a floor of 7.5%. The same three percentage point cut, with a floor of 10.5%, applied to the special cash loans for pensioners. For home loans the cut was smaller, up to 0.5 percentage points below the rates banks were offering in July 2025. Banks also had to scrap the loan processing fee and keep the offer valid for at least 12 months.

Sources disagree on the exact expiration date. The N1 news portal states in one place that the program runs through September 15, then a few sentences later that it ends on September 16. The 021 portal does not give an expiration date at all, since its report covers the program’s announcement from August 2025, when the NBS ordered banks to have their offers ready by September 15 of that year. That date also matches the day the program took effect a year earlier, according to both outlets, which makes it the more likely of the two dates.

By the end of July 2026, more than 470,000 loans had been approved under the program, worth a combined total of over 380 billion RSD (about 3.24 billion EUR), according to data the NBS provided to journalists. Of that amount, 72% went toward refinancing existing debt and 26% toward new cash loans.

Postanska stedionica stood out for its low rate, the only bank in July 2026 offering a cash loan at 5.99%. Most other banks ranged between 6.90% and 7.5%, while Jetel banka had the highest rate on offer, at 8.6%.

According to the NBS’s estimate, total citizen savings on cash and consumer loans under the program could reach 40 billion RSD (about 341 million EUR) over the next five years, of which up to 12 billion RSD (about 102.3 million EUR) would come in the first year of repayment alone. A single cash loan’s monthly installment could be up to 16% lower than some banks’ standard offers, which over the full repayment period would add up to savings of as much as 200,000 RSD (about 1,705 EUR). For home loans, the installment could be up to 6% lower, with savings over the full repayment period exceeding 9,000 EUR.

The NBS announced the program in August 2025, with governor Jorgovanka Tabakovic explaining the reasoning:

We always look at the measures we adopt from the standpoint of a long-term sustainable general interest, and the motive behind every decision we make is to make life and business easier for all our citizens and the economy. For the NBS, independence has never meant isolation from the state and the economic policy pursued by Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and the Government of Serbia. We are adopting these measures as well in order to protect and improve the living standard of our citizens, above all those with lower incomes.

Tabakovic said at the time, when the program was introduced.

Serbian outlets reported in late August that the NBS had kept its key interest rate at 5.75%, leaving installments on existing loans unchanged. Now, with the special regime for incomes up to 100,000 dinars expiring, the question is whether banks will keep offering similar terms on their own. The NBS has said it will monitor how the program played out and analyze its effect on the banking sector, and that it will revise its recommendations to banks if needed.