Nicaragua Statutory legal interest (interés legal)

What this value means

Fixed 9% per annum, stated twice in the Code and unchanged since it took effect (the Código Civil was sanctioned 1 February 1904, its promulgating decree published in the Diario Oficial 2148 of 5 February 1904, in force three months later). The rate is residual and runs from mora: an agreed rate displaces it (arto. 1867), and where interest is stipulated in general terms without a figure the legal rate fills the gap (arto. 3401), as it does wherever the rate is doubtful, ambiguous or undetermined (arto. 3928). In a mutuo with no express interest clause the loan is presumed gratuitous and the lender may claim only the legal rate for the period of default (arto. 3398) — no interest runs before mora. SCOPE CARVE-OUTS WRITTEN INTO ART. 1867 ITSELF: 'En los negocios comerciales se estará a lo que dispone el Código de Comercio. Los montes de piedad, cajas de ahorros e instituciones bancarias, se regirán por sus reglamentos especiales; y en su defecto, por las presentes disposiciones' — so commercial dealings take the Código de Comercio rules and regulated financial institutions take their own, with the civil 9% applying only in default of those. NO COMPOUNDING: arto. 3414, in the wording given by the reform published in La Gaceta 225 of 8 October 1934, prohibits charging interest on accrued interest, but permits periods of not less than one year to be stipulated for liquidating accrued unpaid interest, after which interest may run on the liquidated capital. THE 9% IS NOT A CEILING. Separate statutes cap what may be AGREED, and they move: Ley 176, Ley Reguladora de Préstamos entre Particulares (consolidated text approved 30 November 2023, published in La Gaceta 153 of 20 August 2024), art. 2 sets the maximum annual rate for private lending at the weighted average rate charged by authorised commercial banks on the date the loan is contracted, per rubro, which the Banco Central de Nicaragua must publish in a nationally circulated written medium in the last five days of each month to govern the whole of the following month, excluding credit-card and overdraft rates from the average; art. 4 requires interest to be charged on outstanding balances only, caps moratory interest at 25% of the rate originally agreed, and forbids capitalisation. Lenders making more than two loans at interest a year are treated as prestamistas and must register, banks and licensed financial institutions excepted. Retrieval note: poderjudicial.gob.ni and legislacion.asamblea.gob.ni refuse connections from automated fetchers; the code text above was read from a consolidated edition carrying the Boletín Judicial concordances, and the OAS mirror cited holds the same Code.

Get it programmatically

curl https://latamref.dev/v1/ni/statutory-interest
# $0.005 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History:    curl https://latamref.dev/v1/ni/statutory-interest/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://latamref.dev/provenance/ni/statutory-interest

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The same figure elsewhere: Panama · Paraguay · Peru · Trinidad and Tobago · Uruguay · all 22