Serbia’s central bank: Inflation within target band, where it will stay over the medium term

“The dinar/euro exchange rate is almost unchanged (only 0.3 percent change), despite substantial challenges,” the NBS said in a press release on its results in 2025.

It noted that gross foreign exchange (FX) reserves measured 29.4 bn euro at end-November 2025, and that gold holdings in FX reserves in 2025 increased to a record-high level of 52.4 tons at end-November 2025.

Dinar savings continued to expand in 2025 – by 15.2 bn dinars (eight percent), to over 206 bn dinars at end-November 2025.

“The acceptance of Discover cards in the DinaCard acceptance network was enabled in 2025. The acceptance network of UnionPay cards issued abroad in the DinaCard acceptance network expanded further. The number of points of sale where it is possible for DinaCard users to withdraw cash increased considerably in 2025,” the central bank said.

It added that the credit rating was maintained with all three rating agencies, including the investment-grade rating awarded to Serbia by Standard & Poor’s in 2024. Such a result was underpinned by high FX reserves, responsible monetary policy conduct and a stable and resilient financial sector, the NBS said.

In order to protect citizens’ interests and prevent psychological pressures on the FX market, the NBS adopted a temporary measure abolishing the fee charged by exchange offices when buying euros from or selling them to citizens.

“All the results achieved in coordination with other economic policy makers in our country in the extremely challenging year of 2025 represent a confirmation of sound macroeconomic policies. Among the key factors underpinning Serbia’s favorable credit rating in 2025, the rating agencies highlighted high FX reserves, preserved relative stability of the dinar exchange rate against the euro, responsible pursuit of monetary policy and a stable and resilient financial sector,” emphasized NBS Governor Jorgovanka Tabakovic.

She added that the NBS, the IMF, rating agencies and other important stakeholders in the international economic system expect inflation to continue moving within the target band (3±1.5 percent) over the medium term as well, pointing to continued conduct of responsible policies, while the reserves we have built remain a guarantee of stability in the coming period as well.

As part of supporting government measures aimed at improving household living standards, banks were presented with supervisory expectations to update their current offers, so that employees and pensioners with regular monthly income of up to 100,000 dinars should be offered consumer and cash loans in dinars, as well as housing loans under more favorable terms. According to the central bank, all banks acted pursuant to the presented expectations and many of them offered even more favorable terms to citizens.

As of September 2025, banks approved around 180,000 cash and consumer loans, loans to refinance these loans and housing loans under more favorable terms, in the total amount of around 143 bn dinars.

The approval of low-value dinar consumer loans (up to 150,000 dinars with up to three-year maturity and effective interest rate of 0 percent) which carry lower risk was facilitated on a permanent basis, additionally facilitating households’ access to financing.

Over 6,100 natural persons used this facility, in the total amount of 4.7 bn dinars, in the form of rescheduling cash, consumer and similar loans through a three-year extension of the repayment term, which helped alleviate the burden on their budgets, the NBS said.

The central bank said that, in 2025, high capital adequacy of the banking sector (capital adequacy ratio of almost 21 percent) was maintained, along with favorable structure of capital – the highest quality Common Equity Tier 1 capital accounted for around 92 percent, high liquidity of the banking sector – all the relevant indicators continued to post twice higher values than regulatory minimums.

The quality of the banking sector loan portfolio has improved – the NPLs were at their historical minimum of 2.14 percent, the NBS said.