Private sector credit growth decelerated further in October due to the lower demand from businesses, which are putting all investment plans on hold in anticipation of a second wave of coronavirus in winter.
In October, private sector credit came down to 8.6 per cent from 9.5 per cent the previous month, according to the data from the Bangladesh Bank.
This growth is 6.2 percentage points lower than the central bank’s target of 14.8 per cent for the fiscal year.
“Private sector credit growth would not increase much until March next year as our economy and businesses are not fully recovered,” said Syed Mahbubur Rahman, managing director of Mutual Trust Bank.
It would hover around the 9 per cent-mark in the upcoming days.
The country’s banks were disbursing loans from several stimulus packages from June to September, which caused the uptick.
“But now, the flow of disbursement has decreased as a number of the stimulus packages have already been implemented,” said Rahman, also a former chairman of the Association of Bankers, Bangladesh, a platform of banks’ MDs.
As of October, total outstanding loans to the private sector stood at Tk 11,14,322.4 crore, according to the BB data.
