Trading and services sectors provided robust impetus to the overall credit offtake from the commercial banks in May this year, according to the Qatar Central Bank figures. Qatar’s commercial banks’ total loan portfolio expanded about 6% year-on-year to QR955.73bn in May 2019, said the figures released by the central bank. Of the QR955.73bn loan portfolio, some 92% or QR874.75bn was domestic credit and the remaining 8% or QR80.98bn was overseas credit. Of the total credit, public sector received as much as QR307.7bn and private sector QR633.26bn in May this year. “The private sector loan growth has outpaced the total credit expansion and that in itself is an indicator of its resiliency,” an analyst with an investment house said. Of the QR874.75bn domestic credit, the services sector received as much as QR220.57bn, registering about 13% growth year-on-year. The services constituted one-fourth of the domestic credit in the review period. Credit to the general services amounted to QR199.7bn and those to financial services was QR20.86bn. The real estate sector registered about 4% year-on-year growth in credit offtake to QR202.5bn in May this year. The sector accounted for 23% of the total domestic credit. The real estate developers’ credit offtake amounted to QR77.32bn, followed by commercial housing (QR61.79bn) and private housing (QR26.64bn). The government sector saw its credit offtake at QR125.22bn, which constituted 14% of the total domestic loan portfolio. However, it witnessed more than 14% year-on-year decline in the review period. The consumption loans, which accounted for 15% of the total domestic credit, witnessed more than 2% growth to QR130.21bn in May 2019. The loans to Qataris stood at QR114.96bn and those to non-Qataris were at QR15.24bn. The general trade credit expanded about 63% year-on-year to QR123.9bn, which accounted for 14% of the total domestic credit. Much of the general trade credit went for commercial agencies QR58.31bn at the end of May 31, 2019. The credit to the industrial sector amounted to QR26.81bn, which witnessed about 10% year-on-year decline. The sector constituted 3% of the total domestic credit. Of the QR26.81bn credit to the industrials, heavy industry received QR8.91bn, natural gas (QR8.64bn), industrial manufacturing (QR7.29bn) and oil (QR1.96bn). The bulk of the loans to natural gas sector went for drilling wells and production; while in the case of heavy industry, the loans largely went for electricity generation. Building materials and gypsum products as well as steel and allied products largely constituted the loan portfolio within the industrial manufacturing sector. The credit to the contracting sector amounted to QR36.12bn, which reported more than 10% decline year-on-year in May this year. It constituted more than 4% of the total domestic credit. The bulk of the sectoral credit went towards building contractors (QR18.4bn), others (QR11.82bn), roads (QR2.01bn), maintenance (QR1.98bn) and electrical (QR1.33bn). Total assets of commercial banks in Qatar registered about 6% year-on-year increase to QR1.43tn at the end of May this year.
Source – Fibre2Fashion.
