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Cambodia: $50 billion credit to private sector in Q1
Banking and financial institutions in Cambodia provided $50.7 billion of credit in the first quarter of this year to the private sector in the Kingdom for investment and economic activities, according to the figures released yesterday by National Bank of Cambodia (NBC).
The figures show that the amount of credit released has increased by 22.4 percent from $41.4 billion in the same period of last year. Construction and wholesale-retail sector are the two top receivers among the seven recipients that include services, agriculture, households, manufacturing and others.
Construction and wholesale-retail sectors have borrowed $13.7 billion and $12.6 billion — a 29.3 percent and 26.1 percent increase respectively from the same period of 2021, while services and agriculture have been provided similarly with $5 billion and $4.8 billion respectively — about 11.5 percent higher than the amount they got in the first quarter of 2021, the data shows.
Among the rest of the recipients, the “others” category received $10.2 billion in January-March of this year — nearly 17 percent surge from the same period of 2021, while the amount of loans offered to households has risen by 37 percent to $2.7 billion — the most rapid rise among all of these recipients in the first quarter of 2022, according to the figures.
Manufacturing sector has borrowed $1.7 billion from banking and financial institutions in Cambodia in the first three months of this year, which is 24.8 percent more than the amount they borrowed in the same period of last year, which is the least (of borrowings), according the report.
Chea Serey, director-general of NBC, said recently that even though Association of Banks in Cambodia and Cambodia Microfinance Association have taken care of promoting financial inclusiveness for small and medium-sized enterprises, the backbone of the national economy, they still faced some challenges.
“Access to finance is an obstacle for small and medium-sized enterprises due to lack of collateral, while fulfilling the requirements to get loans, lack of financial statements and lack of financial knowledge are other challenges,” Serey said, adding that since early 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic has severely affected the economic activities, especially business operations.
The impact included “lower-income, impeded production chain, capability to fulfill obligations to loans they received from banking and financial institutions, while they are in need of an additional financial resource to sustain their business operations,” she said.
About 448 businesses in the private sector in Cambodia have been guaranteed by Credit Guarantee Corporation of Cambodia (CGCC) to access loans in the range of $6,000 to $1 million without collaterals and letters of guarantee were provided for 343 working capital loans, 103 investment expansions and two capital expenditures, according to a report released by the state-owned CGCC.
Source: https://www.khmertimeskh.com/501104729/50-billion-credit-to-private-sector-in-q1/