在全球经济崩溃中乌克兰货币暴跌，之后瓦莱里·伊林家的财政也面临困境——他恐怕，他们家将永远买不起一套更大的房子了。伊林先生现年37岁，是工作于首都基辅一家电信公司的信息技术经理，他以美元抵押购买了一套三室的新房。因为汇率下跌，他的月供倍增，现在已经超出了他的整月工资。
“起初我很震惊。现在我则试着想办法在这种情况下保护我的家庭，”这位已有三个孩子的父亲说，现在他必须要用10，200格里夫纳兑换1，200美元来支付这个价值11万美元的新房月供。而他每月的工资仅为880美元。
目前，他的分期付款已经到期，但如果他延交三个月的话就会失去房子。“我从没想过会发生这样的事，”他说。
伊林先生的故事在整个东欧都很普遍，像乌克兰、波兰、匈牙利和罗马尼亚这些国家的银行以前不顾后果地贷美元、欧元和瑞士法郎，现在当这些国家货币暴跌后，都面临着一波不良贷款和违约。
买房者们借贷，却没有想到本国货币暴跌会使他们的付款激增。
危机使这些后共产主义国家想要快速繁荣的希望变得渺茫，而这些国家近年来部分由于外国借款使然，曾有显著发展。外国贷款问题似将延伸至西欧业已动摇的金融系统中，那里的一些银行正严重面临着这些新兴经济体。
分析家们表示由于欧洲复兴开发银行、世界银行和欧洲投资银行所提供的310亿美元的巨额援助资金，银行部门可能能够顺利运营下去。
但是该领域从个人轻率借贷所带来的苦难中吸取了惨痛教训。
“我认为这是政府政策、银行管理及银行本身的严重失误，银行应该早就知道得很清楚，并且已经意识到本国货币贬值的危险，”环球通视的一位新兴市场金融分析家托比·怀特说。
在乌克兰，消费者们蜂拥借贷美元购买吸尘器、手机、房子和进口汽车，这些车还给基辅带来了长期不断的交通堵塞。外币贷款利率比格里夫纳贷款利率更低，这点吸引了他们——银行向伊林先生提供的美元利率仅为13%，而与此相对格里夫纳的利率则是23%——并且格里夫纳以前一直保有稳定记录。
去年五月，中央银行已经停止对格里夫纳的固定汇率有四年之久了，期间一直任市场调节。自九月遭受危机以来，货币已经贬值了43%，随着出口下降，投资者逃离新兴市场，对美元的汇率也从4.9上升到8.5。
根据在基辅的崇德资本投资银行所说，约70%的消费贷款——其占总贷款的36%，是以外币贷出，其中主要为美元，这意味着那些家庭的贷款偿还要增加近一倍。约半数的公司贷款也是美元。
结果是，今年在乌克兰将有达25%的贷款成为不良贷款——一些是违约，一些是重组，对照好的年景，根据龙资本投资银行的数据，不良贷款只有2%到4%。
“主要的危险是问题贷款的增长，”龙资本的一位金融分析家威塔利·瓦里司库克称。
乌克兰“三方对话”投资银行将今年问题贷款的数字定在11%到12%。
中央银行已经控制了八家受挤兑和不良贷款问题动摇的银行。
危机将带来的损失不只针对东欧银行，也针对它们在西欧的母行，如奥地利的来富埃森和“第一”银行、法国的兴业银行、意大利的联合信贷银行等。分析家们乐观地表示，由于西方银行对其当地子公司的支持以及巨额援助资金，欧洲的银行部门将会复苏。
来富埃森银行已经表示它将注入1亿6000万美元来支持其乌克兰分行。
当伊林先生一家的三室新房在建期间，他与36岁的妻子莱丝雅及3个孩子一同住在一间两室的房子里，由于妻子作电脑程序员的收入，伊林先生有希望留住他的当前抵押。但是成千上万的其他家庭可能就没有这样幸运了。
上个月因政策分歧致使援助乌克兰计划被冻结后，上周，国际货币基金组织贷给乌克兰的164亿美元的紧急资金的第二笔重要付款也即将到期。
在邻国波兰，约60%的零售贷款是基于瑞士法郎。现在，当八月的高峰过后，波兰兹罗提比对瑞士法郎约贬值了60%，这证明当时的选择很有问题。
波兰国家银行报告称，3.5%的消费贷款和6.2%的公司贷款令人堪忧。
在罗马尼亚，外币贷款主要是欧元，占全部零售贷款的60%。根据中央银行的数据显示，对比十一月，十二月的个人欧元贷款违约增长了8%——去年罗马尼亚货币列伊对欧元的汇率下降20%是其上涨原因。
匈牙利有70%的民间贷款是瑞士法郎，随着福林对法郎的汇率下降了50%，现在的景况非常凄凉。
“都到了这种程度，银行似乎才感觉出他们的外币借方有问题，”彼得·杜罗奈伊说，他的主要投资都在布达佩斯基金管理公司。
KIEV, Ukraine — After Ukraine’s currency collapsed in the global meltdown, so did Valery Ilyin’s household finances - and, he fears, his family’s dream of a bigger home. Mr. Ilyin, a 37-year-old information-technology manager at a telecommunications company in the capital, Kiev, has a mortgage in dollars for a new, three-room apartment. His payments doubled because of the falling exchange rate, to more than his entire monthly salary.
Some analysts predict that dozens of Ukraine’s 180 banks will go under this year as many consumers are predicted to default on mortgage loans, and bankruptcies could threaten the solvency the banking system.
"First, I was shocked. Now, I am trying to think of ways how I can protect my family in this situation,” said the father of three, who is now forced to spend 10,200 hryvnia to buy $1,200 to cover his monthly mortgage payment on the new apartment, which cost $110,000. His salary is only $880 a month.
So far, he is up to date on his payments, but he can lose the apartment if he is three months late. “I never expected anything like this to happen,” he said.
Mr. Ilyin’s story is familiar across Eastern Europe, where banks in countries like Ukraine, Poland, Hungary and Romania loaned recklessly in dollars, euros and Swiss francs and are now facing a wave of bad loans and defaults after the currencies of those countries plummeted.
Homebuyers took on debt not expecting that a sharp drop in their country’s currency would balloon their payments.
The crisis dims hopes for quick prosperity for these post-communist countries, which had grown impressively over recent years in part because of foreign lending. The foreign-loan problem threatens to spread to an already shaken banking system in Western Europe, where some banks are heavily exposed to these emerging economies.
Analysts say the banking sector likely can stay afloat thanks to a hefty $31 billion aid package from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Redevelopment, the World Bank and the European Investment Bank.
But the region is learning a painful lesson in terms of personal hardship from imprudent borrowing.
"I think this was a serious failure of government policy, of bank regulation and of banks themselves who should have known better and been aware of the risk of the local currency depreciation,” said Toby Wight, an emerging markets banking analyst with Global Insight.
In Ukraine, consumers rushed to borrow in dollars to purchase vacuum cleaners, cell phones, apartments and the imported cars that brought Kiev a never-ending traffic jam. They were lured by lower interest rates than on hryvnia-based loans - Mr. Ilyin was offered a 13 percent interest rate in dollars as opposed to 23 percent in hryvnia - and the hryvnia’s previous stable record.
The central bank ended four years of fixed rates for the hryvnia in May, letting the market set the rate. Since the crisis hit in September, the currency has lost 43 percent of its value, from 4.9 to 8.5 against the dollar, as exports fell and investors fled emerging markets.
About 70 percent of consumer loans, which constitute 36 percent of all loans here, were extended in foreign currency, mainly in dollars, according to the Renaissance Capital investment bank in Kiev, meaning that credit payments for these households almost doubled. About half of corporate loans also were denominated in dollars.
As a result, up to 25 percent of loans in Ukraine may go bad this year - some defaulted and some restructured, as opposed to 2 percent to 4 percent during a good year, according to Dragon Capital investment "The main risk is the growth of problem loans,” said Vitaliy Vavryshchuk, a banking analyst with Dragon Capital.
Troika Dialog Ukraine put the number of poorly performing loans this year at 11 percent to 12 percent.
The central bank already has taken control of eight banks, shaken by deposit withdrawals and bad loan problems.
The crisis threatens losses not only for Eastern European banks, but also their parent banks in Western Europe, such as Austria’s Raiffeisen and Erste Bank, France’s Societe Generale, Italy’s UniCredit and others. Analysts are optimistic that Europe’s banking sector will be revived thanks to the Western banks’ support of their local subsidiaries and the hefty aid package.
Raiffeisen bank has said it will inject $160 million of capital to support its Ukrainian unit.
Mr. Ilyin, who shares a two-room apartment with his wife, Lesya, 36, and three children while their three-room apartment is being built, hopes to keep his mortgage current thanks to his wife’s income as a computer programmer. But tens of thousands of other households here may not be so fortunate.
Ukraine moved closer last week to getting a second crucial installment of a $16.4 billion emergency fund from the International Monetary Fund, after the program was frozen last month because of policy disagreements. A chunk of that loan will go toward recapitalizing the banks.
In neighboring Poland, about 60 percent of retail loans were extended in Swiss francs. That is proving to be a questionable choice now that the Polish zloty lost about 60 percent of its value against the Swiss franc since August peaks.
Poland’s National Bank reported that 3.5 percent of loans to consumers and 6.2 percent of loans to corporations were troubled.
In Romania, foreign currency loans, mainly taken in euros, constitute 60 percent of all retail loans. Defaults on personal euro loans grew 8 percent in December compared with November figures, according to the central bank - a rise attributable to a 20 percent drop of the Romanian leu to the euro last year.
Hungary has 70 percent of household loans denominated in Swiss francs, and with the forint down 50 percent to the franc, things are looking bleak.
“It seems that at that level banks start to feel that their foreign-currency debtors are having problems,” said Peter Duronelly, investment chief at the Budapest Fund Management Co.
