Croatia Statutory default interest (zatezne kamate)
Croatia Statutory default interest (zatezne kamate) is 5.4 percent, in force since 1 Jul 2026. Last checked against the official source on 10 Aug 2026.
Croatia's statutory default interest for non-commercial relations under Zakon o obveznim odnosima čl. 29: the reference rate plus three percentage points, fixed for each calendar half-year — 5.40% from 1 July 2026.
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What this value means
This is the CIVIL figure — the 'ostali odnosi' (other relations) tier of Zakon o obveznim odnosima čl. 29(2), which is the reference rate plus THREE percentage points. Čl. 29(1) makes default interest automatic: a debtor who is late with a money obligation owes it on top of the principal, and čl. 30(1) gives the creditor the right to it whether or not any loss was suffered (with the right to claim more if the actual damage is greater). DO NOT USE FOR TRADERS OR PUBLIC BODIES: the same paragraph sets a separate, much higher tier — reference rate plus EIGHT percentage points — for relations arising from commercial contracts and from contracts between a trader and a person governed by public law (10.40% from 1 July 2026), which is served separately as this API's late-payment-interest product. Choosing the wrong tier is the single most common error on Croatian claims, because both come from one sentence of one article. HALF-YEARLY SNAPSHOT: the reference rate is the ECB main refinancing rate (or the marginal rate from variable-rate tenders) in force on 1 January for the first half-year and on 1 July for the second; the HNB must publish it in the Narodne novine. An ECB move mid-half-year does not change the rate until the next 1 January or 1 July — the reference held at 2.15% for the whole of the first half of 2026 and stepped to 2.40% only on 1 July 2026, after the ECB's June increase. THE REFERENCE CHANGED IN 2023: before Croatia adopted the euro, čl. 29 was built on the HNB's average interest rate on balances of loans over one year to non-financial corporations, with margins of five and three points; citations and calculators still using that basis will be wrong for any period from 1 January 2023 onward. FURTHER RULES: čl. 29(3)-(5) let traders and public bodies agree a different default rate, subject to the čl. 26(2) ceiling and to nullity where the agreed rate causes obvious inequality contrary to good faith; čl. 29(6) stops a HIGHER contractual interest rate from running once the debtor is in default — the opposite of the rule in several neighbouring systems; čl. 27(1) voids any clause providing that unpaid interest itself bears interest. Croatia has no ultra alterum tantum ceiling: default interest keeps accruing past the size of the principal. NEXT FIXING: reference rate for the half-year beginning 1 January 2027, published by the HNB in the Narodne novine in late December 2026.
Get it programmatically
curl https://euroref.dev/v1/hr/statutory-interest
# $0.005 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History: curl https://euroref.dev/v1/hr/statutory-interest/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://euroref.dev/provenance/hr/statutory-interestOther Croatia series: Policy interest rate · Value added tax (porez na dodanu vrijednost) · VAT registration threshold · National minimum wage (minimalna plaća) · Public holidays · Consumer price index (annual inflation) · Corporate income tax (porez na dobit) · Withholding tax rates · Personal income tax · Statutory social-insurance contributions · ECB main refinancing operations rate (fixed rate) · Late-payment interest (EU Late Payment Directive)
The same figure elsewhere: Cyprus · Czech Republic · Denmark · Estonia · Finland · all 34