& çâÌæÚUæð´ ·¤è ¥ôÚU Îð¹Ùæ ÁæÚUè ÚU¹ð´ ¥ÍæüÌ ¥ÂÙð ÜÿØ ÂÚU ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´Ð ãæÚU Ù ×æÙð´, €UØô´ç·¤ ·¤æ× ·¤ÚUÙð âð ¥æÂ·¤ô ©gðàØ ·¤è Âýæç# ãôÌè ãñ ¥õÚU ÁèßÙ ·¤æ ¹æÜèÂÙ ÎêÚU ãôÌæ ãñÐ ÖÜð ãè ÁèßÙ ×ð´ ç·¤ÌÙè Öè ·¤çÆÙæ§ü €UØô´ Ù ¥æ°, çÁ™ææâæ ¥õÚU ©ˆâæã ÕÙæ° ÚU¹ð´Ð ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´, ÜÿØ ã×ðàææ ¥æÂ·Ô¤ Âæâ ãôÌð ãñ´ çÁ‹ãð´ ÂæÙð ·Ô¤ çÜ° ÂýØæâ ¥æÂ ·¤Öè Öè àæéM¤ ·¤ÚU â·¤Ìð ãñ´Ð

BB for narrowing spread to lower lending rate

Banks under fire for depriving depositors

Staff Correspondent
The central bank at a meeting yesterday expressed dissatisfaction at the commercial banks for carrying on profiteering at the expense of depositors.
The Bangladesh Bank (BB) has been asking the banks to narrow the gap between their interest rates on lending and deposit, also known as interest spread, which contains their profit and expenses, by cutting down lending interests.
The commercial banks however have slashed interest rates on both deposit and lending, thereby
keeping their high interest spread or profit margin intact.
"We've advised the banks how to reduce the interest spread without penalising the depositors," BB Deputy Governor Nazrul Huda said after the meeting with the chief executives of all commercial banks at the BB head office.
"In Bangladesh this spread is too wide: between 6 and 12 percent," he noted, "whereas in other countries it normally ranges from 3 to 4 percent." The meeting, chaired by BB Governor Fakhruddin Ahmed, reviewed the 'spread' situation. On average, the spread in the nationalised commercial banks is 5.75 percent, in private banks 6.6 percent and in foreign banks 7.5 percent.
Among them, 16 banks have interest spread as high as 7 to 12 percent.
The BB moves to cut interest rates were meant to benefit the loan receivers in order to boost investment by lowering lending interest rates and, at the same time, not to affect the depositors by leaving the rates on deposit unchanged.
The banks however disagreed with the BB over the method used in measuring the spread. They said the spread would come out lower if the central bank took some additional factors into calculation.
Bankers' Association President and National Credit and Commerce Bank Ltd. Managing Director M Aminuzzaman said, "By the next two months, we'll try to fix a standard method for spread calculation in consultation with bankers and the BB. We'll also narrow down the spread."
Huda however pointed out that the central bank calculated the spread as per an internationally recognised method.
At the meeting, the commercial banks raised an issue of grievance. They alleged the Bureau of AntiCorruption was filing cases against the banks instead of the exporters for a major chunk of the country's export proceeds having remained overseas.
The bankers said the bureau should deal with such cases through the central bank, so that they could be free of harassment. The BB governor assured them of his intervention in the matter.
The central bank also alerted the banks on foreign exchange management as some banks incurred a loss of Tk 124 crore in this business in just one year. Fakhruddin asked the chief executives of the banks to personally look into foreign exchange dealings.
The central bank also asked all the banks to send it a list of their defaulted loans, whose cases have remained unresolved for more than 120 days with money loan courts.