ISTANBUL, July 25 Reuters The Turkish Central Bank said on Tuesday it had set the monthly growth limit for lira commercial loans at 2.5, down from a previous 3, excluding export, investment and agriculture loans, to complement steps taken in a policy simplification process.

Last week the bank hiked its policy rate by 250 basis points to 17.5, continuing to reverse President Tayyip Erdogan39;s lowrates policy as it promised more tightening.

After that policy meeting the bank said the simplification process would continue gradually and selective credit and quantitative tightening decisions were taken to support the monetary tightening process.

Among the steps, a reserve requirement ratio of 15 on FXprotected accounts was announced on July 21.

The bank said on Tuesday it had also decided to set the growth limit for vehicle loans at 2, down from 3, and to keep the 3 limit for general purpose loans unchanged.

The monthly maximum interest rate applied to credit card cash utilization and overdraft accounts was raised to 2.89 to control inflation and balance domestic demand, it also said.

Export and investment loans as well as loans for the earthquake zone will be exempted from the bank39;s credit restricting measures.

Steps have also been taken to support exporters access to financing, with the daily limit for rediscount credits raised to 1.5 billion lira.

Reporting by Nevzat Devranoglu; Editing by Daren Butler

Source Reuters