Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov.17
By Fatih Karimov - Trend: Iranian banks give more loans to state sector than private sector, the chairman of Iran's chamber of commerce stated.
Gholam Hossein Shafei added that based on the Central Bank of Iran's statistics, the share of the agriculture and industry sector of the total loans was 7.38 percent in the first half of the current year, Iran's IRNA news agency reported on November 17.
Meanwhile, the share of the commerce sector of the total loans was 5.49 percent, he noted.
The figures were 4.39 percent and 4.7 percent in the first half of the past year, respectively, he added.
The current Iranian calendar year began on March 21.
He referred to budget deficit and instability in the government's economic policies as the main problems that domestic producers are grappling with.
Iranian banks gave 1,463 trillion rials (some $45.7 billion based on the exchange rate of US dollar at the free market) worth of loans in the first half of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-September 22).
USD exchange rate in Iran is currently about 32,000 rials.
The figure shows an 83 percent increase compared to the same period two years ago, Iran's ISNA News Agency reported on October 27.
The assets have been allocated to different sectors such as agriculture, industries and mines, housing, trade, etc.
The governor of Iran's Central Bank previously vowed that the country's banks would give around 2,850 trillion rials by the end of the current Iranian calendar year. So far, half of the mentioned figure has been secured.
Iran has been struggling with bad loans in the past few years.
Iran's Melli Bank, Parsian Bank and Tejarat Bank have the highest amount of bad loans in Iran.
Of the total 870 trillion rials (about $28 billion) in bad loans, Melli Bank's share is 130 trillion rials (about $4.2 billion), Parsian and Tejarat banks' shares are 110 trillion rials each (about $3.5 billion), Iran's Mehr news agency reported on August 3.
Some 61 people have debts of over $32 million, accounting for 19 percent of the total debt.
Edited by CN