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Default loans creep up again

Sluggish business, recession blamed

Rejaul Karim Byron
Default loans in the first nine months of this year have increased by 4 percent or Tk 928 crore and stood at Tk 23,904 crore, thanks to sluggish business and global economic recession.
The amount of default loan showed a declining trend in the recent years but this year it started rising.
Though the default loans of private commercial banks (PCB), foreign commercial banks (FCB), specialised banks (SB) increased,
those decreased in state owned banks (SOBs).
A high official of a PCB said the amount of default loan appears lower mainly due to loan write-offs by SOBs.
An official of a SOB said they have written off loans but adopted various measures to lower default loan.
Several private bank officials said the sluggishness in business caused by global financial meltdown has added to loan defaults.
According to a Bangladesh Bank data
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default loans with SOBs on September 30 this year decreased by 6.34 percent or Tk 810 crore and stood at Tk 11,954 crore over December last. The amount was Tk 12,764 crore in December 31, 2008.
In PCBs the default loan figure increased by 26 percent or Tk 1,475 crore and stood at Tk 7,173 crore in September. In December the amount was Tk 5,698 crore.
The same way the default loans of the FCBs increased by 31 percent or Tk 89 crore in the last nine months. The default loan of SBs increased by 4.68 percent or Tk 175 crore during the first nine months.
Though the default loan of FCBs increased substantially, their overall default loan is much lower - only 2.58 percent of total outstanding loans.
Managing Director of National Credit and Commerce Bank (NCCB) Nurul Amin said, "The negative impact of global recession on the garments and textile sectors contributed to the increase in the default loan. Besides, business was also sluggish which resulted in low recovery."
Nurul Amin also said, "If you take specific data about the textile and garment sectors you will find that more default loans are lying with them."
An official of Prime Bank said the SOBs made indiscriminate rescheduling without down payment. Besides, they made more write-offs, which caused the fall in their default loans.
But instead of rescheduling at random, the private banks did it on case-to-case basis and as a result their default loan did not fall much, said the Prime Bank official.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Agrani Bank Syed
Abu Naser Bakhtiar said, "We did rescheduling, but took other measures as well. So our default loan remained low. However, I don't know about otherSOBs."
Abu Naser said, "We have formed a special team for recovering default loans. Alongside cash recovery, we reduced default loans through rescheduling, write-offs, and out-of-court settlements'."
He also said, "We have appointed six private debt recovery agencies through which we are recovering loans. In this year we have recovered about Tk 26 crore through these agencies."
Default loans continued to increase and at one stage the sum reached up to Tk 25,000 crore. In the recent years, reform in banking sector and loan write-offs brought the amount belowTk 22,000 crore.
However, a Bangladesh Bank high official said though the default loan increased to some extent, it is still only 11 percent of total outstanding loans. This shows, the banks are monitoring continuously to keep the loan in check.