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Kathmandu Tuesday December 25, 2001 Paush 10, 2058.
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‘Restructuring of
loans a must’
Post Report
KATHMANDU, Dec 24 – Top banking
officials have stressed the need of immediate restructuring of the loan investments in the
export and tourism sector. They also informed that the commercial banks are waiting for a
green signal from the central bank to initiate steps in the same direction.
Addressing a press conference here on Monday,
Narendra Bhattarai, President of Nepal Bankers Association and Managing Director of the
Nepal Bangladesh Bank (NBB) said that the restructuring of the loan and advances of the
service and export oriented industries is the need of hour.
"Since there is high possibility of
revival of these industries in days to come, commercial banks are ready to take steps to
lessen the financial burden of these industries, which has loan burden of around Rs 22
billion," Bhattarai said.
Referring to the flexible monetary steps
announced recently by the Nepal Rastra Bank, he opined that the measures are positive and
can contribute to shore up the ailing economy. However, he said that it would not be
realistic to expect a drastic change in the near future. "Despite the increase in the
liquidity of the banking system, lack of potential and credible borrows is the main
contemporary problem of the banks and it will take time to improve the situation," he
added.
When asked to comment on the possibility on
the further relaxation of the monetary measures, he opined that the central bank should
conduct a detail study on the impact of the recent measures before taking any further
steps. "It should carefully examine to what extent the newly released capital of Rs
1.80 billion from the commercial banks has been able to boost the ailing productive
sector."
He also ruled out any immediate impact on the
deposit interest rates by the new monetary measures of the central bank.
Meanwhile, the Board Meeting of the NBB held
recently has decided to submit a proposal of distributing five percent dividends along
with 2:1 bonus share to its shareholders in the upcoming 7th annual general meeting of the
bank. It also decided to initiate necessary steps for the approval of the proposal from
the central bank.
According to a press release distributed at
the programme, the capital base of the bank has reached Rs 561.6 million. The central bank
had issued a directive to all the commercial banks to raise their capital base by Rs 500
million by the end of last fiscal year.
The total deposit of the bank, by the end of last fiscal
year, reached Rs 8.60 billion whereas the overall investments were Rs 6.98 billion. The
net profit of the bank, during the period surged to Rs 198.7 million against Rs 139.5
million accrued last year.
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