Lithuania’s Special Investigation Service (STT) received 4,729 reports of corruption in 2022, the watchdog said on January 9. “In 2022, almost 30% of the STT’s all pre-trial investigations were opened based on citizen reports. The majority of the received reports were about possible offences in the areas of health care, environmental protection, local government and…
While banks are already charging higher rates on loans, they are slow to raise interest rates on deposits. Lithuania’s banking regulators say this is not okay. The European Central Bank raised interest rates four times last year, with commercial banks passing the raises to their debtors: mortgage rates rose to 4% and consumer loans to…
While Lithuanians have generally welcomed Ukrainians fleeing war, competition in the beauty industry has created resentment among local cosmetologists. Xenia from Odesa (not her real name) came to Klaipeda, Lithuania’s third city, back in March 2022, after deciding it wasn’t safe for herself and her daughter to stay in the city shelled by Russia. They…
EU member states must decide together what to do with Russian assets that have been frozen under sanctions, according to Lithuanian Interior Minister Agne Bilotaite. Her comment comes after Estonia gas recently suggested that it might seize the frozen funds and use them for Ukraine’s reconstruction, as the European Commission is not making any progress…
Vitas Vasiliauskas, a former chief of Lithuania’s central bank and currently an adviser to the prime minister, is joining the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Vasiliauskas confirmed that January 6 was his last day of work with the team of Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte. He will take up his new job in…
Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte expects the parliament to start debating the planned tax reform in its spring session. “The Finance Ministry has drafted a good reform model,” Simonyte said. “Last spring, when the situation was uncertain, we said that the reform should be postponed. Now, we see that we can return to this discussion.”…
With the European Central Bank raising interest rates, the real estate market is expected to cool down. However, it may take some time before properties in Lithuania become more affordable, analysts say. Real estate prices have been rising steadily and quite steeply over the last couple of years, with buyers snatching every property on the…