With article 128 of law 5264/2026, borrowers in Swiss francs, and only those who are current, are given the possibility to join a settlement, converting the loan balance into euros, with a reduction – this concerns the overwhelming majority – of 15% in the conversion exchange rate for the outstanding debt balance. The possibility of joining is valid until 30 September, unless another extension is granted.
The amendment by which the above article was introduced caused disappointment among borrowers. The latter are ultimately called upon to accept as real and irreversible the damage they suffered from the reversal of the exchange rate, while the bank is estimated, on average, to participate in this by only about 7%.
In reality, however, even this small loss will most likely be recovered by the banks from the borrower. By converting the loan into euros, they can organize, on the basis of the interest rate and having excess deposits, better profit margins over the long duration of the settlement that follows.
Moreover, this is not exactly a reduction of the outstanding debt balance by 15%. In the event of termination of the loan due to inability to service it, this part of the debt revives as well. With the amendment, the Government did not even recognize this small relief as a right of the borrower; it offers it to him only as a “reward” if he carries to the end the cross that the banks loaded onto him.
As is known, many of the borrowers of these loans dispute, for reasons related to the way these loans were granted, the amount of their debt. They have resorted or, in any case, retain the right for this reason to resort to Justice.
A critical question, therefore, that several borrowers raise is what the consequences are of joining the settlement of this law with regard to the reservations and claims they maintain, whether due to the use of abusive terms in these contracts or because of the misinformation they received when entering into them.
This is especially in view of the fact that the banks, in order to provide them with the settlement of article 128 of law 5264/2025, in practice compel consumers not only to acknowledge their debt but also to waive the claims they maintain, lawsuits, legal remedies or recourses regarding the dispute of the debt.
In case law, debt acknowledgment agreements are considered either to have a simple evidentiary character as to the calculation of the debt, without any claims being affected, or, even if a stronger character were to be given, in any case they could not justify the unjust enrichment of the bank at the expense of the customer. Equally problematic are agreements waiving the exercise of rights of dispute, especially when they are imposed unilaterally or are not mutually beneficial.
In the present case, the possibility of joining the settlement is provided by legislative provision. That is, it constitutes the exercise of a right of settlement granted by law to the debtor. The bank does not have the possibility to refuse the request and, consequently, it is not permitted to make the borrower’s waiver of dispute rights a subject of negotiation or to make acceptance of the request dependent on that waiver. Therefore, the terms that oblige the debtor to waive judicial claims, whether already brought or not, are null and void.
It could, however, be argued that such a waiver is already regulated in article 128 of law 5264/2025 for any borrower who submits the request. Paragraph 14 of this article provides, upon joining the settlement, for the abolition of pending judicial proceedings that have been initiated or any other settlements or any enforcement measures by creditors against debtors.
In our opinion, the provision can only in fact refer to proceedings concerning enforcement measures by creditors or their successors. This is especially so since article 128 also refers to settlements of the out-of-court mechanism. If the legislator had intended the waiver by borrowers of their dispute rights, he would have established it independently of whether judicial proceedings are pending. Independently, however, even from this, such an interpretation could not be justified for the following reasons either.
The claims of Swiss franc borrowers against the banks or the purchasers of these loans are based mainly on two grounds:
First, that the terms imposing the exchange rate risk on the borrower are non-transparent and abusive and, consequently, invalid and unenforceable and, second, that the borrower received incomplete and misleading information at the stage of concluding the contract, with the result that he was led into a contract that harms him compared with the choice he would otherwise have made.
As regards the first ground, the Court of Justice of the European Union considers incompatible with Directive 93/13/EC on unfair terms, on the basis of the principle of effectiveness, national provisions that make it impossible or excessively difficult to exercise consumers’ rights to remedy the consequences of the use of unfair terms (indicatively C-869/19).
Consequently, an interpretation of the provision could not stand that would lead banks to essentially “blackmail” borrowers, in order to erase a very small part – and not even permanently – of the consequences of the abusive term for them, into accepting the greater part.
As regards the second ground, namely the compensation claims that borrowers maintain because of the misinformation, these are in any event not affected by the settlement of the contractual debt. Compensation claims arise from the bank’s conduct before the conclusion of the contract and are formulated in comparison with the situation in which the borrower would have been if he had not been misled.
However, the conduct of the banks in requiring the borrower to waive lawsuits, legal remedies and recourses does not mean that it has no adverse consequences for him. The most important is that they mislead him about his rights. Thus, in order to include them in the settlement, they compel borrowers to waive pending judicial proceedings concerning the protection of their interests. If this happens, however, an adverse res judicata will be created for the borrower by any dismissive decision that has been issued or, in other cases, irreparable consequences.
The amendment that was ultimately passed assists the banks so that they can “get rid of” the problem of loans in Swiss francs without any worthwhile cost to themselves. But let there not also be tolerance for the misinformation that accompanies its implementation. However much article 128 does not serve the purpose with which it was proclaimed, it cannot also be turned into a tool for undermining the rights or the existing protection of consumers.
Despite the case law in our country to date being divergent, compared with that of other European countries, regarding cases of loans in Swiss francs, everyone must at least respect the judicial struggle that the borrowers want to conduct.
As certain, moreover, it is that a legislative initiative that would proceed, taking into account the conditions under which these loans were granted, to a fair allocation of the exchange rate risk, with substantial participation by the banks, continues, even after the above settlement, to remain equally timely and necessary.
* Dimitris Spyrakos is a doctor of law, lawyer, former Secretary General for Consumer Affairs.