Non-banking financial institutions of the country continue to increase their defaulted loans. At the end of last June, defaulted loans in this sector increased to 24 thousand 711 crores, which is 33.15 percent of the total loans. At the end of December last year, the amount of defaulted loans was 21 thousand 567 crores, which was 29.27 percent of the total loans at that time. Accordingly, defaulted loans increased by 3 thousand 144 crores in 6 months.
However, in financial institutions, defaulted loans increased by Tk 3,144 crores in 6 months, but in the banking sector, defaulted loans increased by Tk 66,000 crores during this period. Bank officials say that non-performing loans are increasing more in banks than in financial institutions. This is because financial institutions have been under strict supervision for three years. And supervision of banks has started since the fall of Awami League government.
According to the data of Bangladesh Bank, due to the funding crisis, loans are not increasing in financial institutions. At the end of last June, the total debt status of these institutions stood at 74 thousand 534 crores, which was 73 thousand 683 crores last December. And at the end of 2022, the debt status was 70 thousand 436 crores. At that time, defaulted loans were 16 thousand 821 crores, which was 23.88 percent of the total loans at that time. This means that in the last year and a half, the debt in the financial institutions sector has increased by Tk 4 thousand 98 crores. Against this, defaulted loans have increased by Tk 7,890 crore. That is, compared to loans, defaulted loans have increased almost twice.
The financial institutions sector was already in bad shape due to lack of proper supervision. However, people’s leasing was discontinued in 2019 due to various reasons, including the inability to return money to depositors. That’s when the situation gets worse. In this, various frauds of Bangladesh Industrial Finance Company (BIFC), International Leasing, FAS Finance and Aviva Finance, owned by Prashant Kumar Halder (PK Halder) came to the fore. Due to widespread discussion and criticism about these, the customer’s confidence in the entire sector is reduced. To boost their confidence, the central bank takes various strict measures for financial institutions.
According to the data of the Central Bank, at the end of June this year, the status of uncollectible or bad loans in the financial sector stood at 21 thousand 33 crores, which is 28.22 percent of the total loans disbursed. Last March, bad debt was Tk 20,000 crore, which is 26.91 percent of the total debt at that time.
According to Bangladesh Bank data, among PK Halder-affiliated financial institutions, People’s Leasing has the highest non-performing loan rate at 99 percent or Tk 1,960 crore. The rate and amount of defaulted loans in other institutions are as follows: International Leasing 94.76 percent or 3 thousand 912 crore taka; FAS Finance 89.56 percent or Tk 1,645 crore and Aviva Finance 71.72 percent or Tk 1,902 crore.
Apart from this, the non-performing loans of First Finance is 94.41 percent, which is 92.37 percent of GSP Finance, 89.41 percent of First Finance, 66.74 percent of Premier Leasing, 59.39 percent of CVC Finance, 59.17 percent of Meridian Finance, 58.17 percent of IIDFC. 64 percent, Haj Finance 57.79 percent, Phoenix Finance 57.79 percent, National Finance 56.86 percent, Bay Leasing 52.82 percent and Uttara Finance 50.48 percent.
Sources -Bangladesh Bank.
