It looks like this was done by the banks voluntarily. So it doesn't increase the risk of this happening again in the future as a surprise. Secondly, this probab

It looks like this was done by the banks voluntarily. So it doesn't increase the risk of this happening again in the future as a surprise. Secondly, this probably reduces the amount of defaults, liens, foreclosures etc. happening all at once that a bank really would rather not deal with. Edit: according to https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-10/italy-negotiating-with-banks-for-mortgage-relief-in-virus-crisis https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-10/italy-neg... the government negotiated this with the banks, and TFA says that not all banks took the deal. So whatever it was, it probably softened the blow a lot.