9 Oct 2020
Financial Institutions
KResearch assesses that the pandemic-stricken economic environment continued to undermine commercial banks’ profitability in 3Q20, with both interest income and fee income on a declining trend that corresponds to the continuous slump in economic activity across many sectors. Moreover, the interest income of the entire system of Thai commercial banks was further impacted by the downward trend in lending rates, which have been falling since late 2019. KResearch projects that the net profit of the Thai banking system in 3Q20 will fall to an estimated level of THB 30.8 billion, or a drop of 66.5 percent YoY in comparison to a net profit of THB 91.6 billion in 3Q19 wherein one particular bank recorded extraordinary profit through the sale of an insurance company’s shares that the bank had held. Nonetheless, this net profit inched up slightly, by around 3.7 percent, compared to the previous quarter due to lower provisioning expenses for 3Q20 among several commercial banks that may somewhat experienced a slowdown after they pursued a proactive provision policy by setting aside exceptionally high provisioning in 2Q20... Read more
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15 Jan 2020
The Bank of Thailand recently revealed details on the improvements of calculation methods for interests and service charges, with the aim of protecting consumers in three areas. These include: 1) prepayment penalties for SME and personal loans; 2) default interests that must be based on outstanding installment of the principal only; and 3) debit and ATM card fees, wherein banks must repay such fees back to cardholders if their cards have been cancelled. ... Read more