Price Indicators as a Measure of Credit Market Integration in the Visegrad Countries

In this paper we assess with price indicators the extent to which credit markets in the Visegrad countries are integrated with the Eurozone countries and we test the hypothesis that the markets of loans provided to nonfinancial companies are more integrated than the markets of loans provided to households in the Visegrad countries. Analysis is based on monthly values of four interest rates for the period January 2005-March 2010. Convergence is taking place in all the analyzed segments of credit market. However, the speed of convergence and the degree of convergence differs among market segments and countries. The tested hypothesis has not been fully confirmed: the markets of loans to nonfinancial companies are more integrated than the consumer loan markets, but less integrated than the mortgage loan markets.