The expenses in the Eesti Pank budget will increase by 4.6% next year to 33.5 million euros. The revenues of the central bank from monetary policy transactions and investment are expected to be 70.9 million euros.

The core activities of the central bank include ensuring cash circulation and payments, analysing the economy and the financial sector, and compiling statistics on the financial sector. Key issues for the central bank in 2026 besides its core activities will be updates to the IT systems, cyber security, and readiness for various crisis scenarios.

Eesti Pank’s expenditures on cash production will reach 1.6 million euros in 2026, the contribution to the joint IT projects of the central banks of the European Union will be 1 million euros, and the cost of services provided to Finantsinspektsioon will be 1.8 million euros. Spending on maintaining real estate properties will be lower next year, mainly because of the sale of Maardu manor.

Eesti Pank will invest 6.6 million euros in fixed assets in 2026. The largest part of the investment will again go to development work that started in 2023 on ATLAS, the new data processing and analysis system for statistics that the central bank plans to start using next summer. ATLAS will allow statistics to be compiled in a more efficient and integrated way, raising the quality of the output. The other major investment next year will be in refurbishing the Eesti Pank museum, which was last done in 2011. A redesign of the permanent exhibition area and the space for press conferences and presentations is planned for the museum.

Eesti Pank is planning to order additional 50-euro banknotes in 2026, and to make the preparations needed for issuing various collector coins in the next two years. Eesti Pank will issue three silver coins next year dedicated to the Olympic Winter Games, the 150th anniversary of the birth of the wrestler Georg Lurich, and the Forest Brothers. It will also issue a two-euro coin with a special design dedicated to the beloved character Sipsik from children’s storybooks.

Eesti Pank will have full-time equivalent positions for 240.4 people next year, which is 3 fewer than in 2025. The payroll of the staff at Eesti Pank will increase by 6% in 2026. Eesti Pank aims to keep the salaries of its employees at roughly the same level as those for similar positions in the financial sector in Tallinn and Harjumaa, which is where the central bank mainly competes for employees. There will be some additional personnel costs next year arising from the amounts paid to members of the Executive Board after their term of office ends to compensate them for the temporary limits on activity imposed by the European Central Bank. Total personnel costs at the central bank next year will be 18.5 million euros.

Eesti Pank is separated from the state budget and state funds in order to guarantee its independence in combating inflation. This means that Eesti Pank is not in any way answerable for the financial liabilities of the state, and the state has no responsibility for Eesti Pank’s financial liabilities. Eesti Pank earns its revenues from the single monetary policy transactions of the euro area and from investing the central bank’s own reserves. Eesti Pank has however channelled a part of its profits to the Estonian state budget in most years. Since 1992 Eesti Pank has allocated a total of 192 million euros from its profit to the state budget.

Additional information:
Hanna Jürgenson
Communications Specialist
Eesti Pank
Tel: 5692 0930
Press enquiries: [email protected]