BELGRADE, Aug 24 (Reuters) – Serbia’s government will order a cap on food and consumer goods profit margins as well as interest rates on cash loans from next week, populist President Aleksandar Vucic said on Sunday.The decrees aimed at raising living standards follow months of daily anti-corruption protests and inflation that rose to 4.9% in July, against the central bank’s target of 3%, give or take 1.5%.
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Vucic said that large retailers of food, beverages and other consumer goods will have to keep profit margins around 20%, down from about 40%, or risk hefty fines.”We are introducing these measures to increase purchasing power and living standards … and (contain) inflation,” Vucic told reporters.The president also said that commercial banks should cap rates on cash loans to private borrowers to about 7.5%, down three percentage points from the average. The central bank this month kept its benchmark rate unchanged at 5.75%.The government will adopt the decree next week, Vucic said.Such decrees are executive orders that do not require parliamentary approval.
Reporting by Aleksandar Vasovic
Editing by David Goodman
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