Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 19
By Fatih Karimov – Trend:
The Iranian banking system paid 4,278.9 trillion rials ($132.1 billion based on official exchange rate of $1=32,390 rials) in loans in the 10-month period from March 20, 2016, the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) said Feb. 19.
The figure indicates a rise by 43.4 percent compared to the first ten months of the last Iranian fiscal year (March 20, 2015-Jan. 21, 2016).
Over $13.9 billion in loans were paid to the various sectors in tenth Iranian calendar month of Day (Dec. 21, 2016-Jan. 20).
The country’s banks paid 1,702.64 trillion rials to the service sector during the 10-month period.
Along with service sector, the highest amounts of loan have been paid to industry and mining (1,241.5 trillion rials), commerce (587.771 trillion rials), housing (386.3 trillion rials) and agriculture (357.668 trillion rials) sectors.
According to IMF, Iran’s GDP growth for the current fiscal year, which started on March 21, 2016 is expected to reach 4.5 percent, however the economic growth will decrease in 2017 to 4.1 percent. The figure is expected to hit 4.3 percent in 2021.
The CBI says that the country’s GDP growth reached 7.4 percent during the first half of current fiscal year.
Iran has been struggling with bad loans over the past few years.