NBP plans GDR issue

Posted on 10.12.06 by StockPK Team @ 9:51 am    

President National Bank of Pakistan Syed Ali Raza has said the bank has planned to issue global depository receipts (GDR).

Talking to journalists at an Iftar party on Tuesday, he said the amount and timing of the GDR would be decided by the government, keeping in view the market conditions.

However, he categorically said the amount raised through the GDR would not be used to meet capital requirements, but would be spent on expanding the bank’s activities.

Replying to questions, he said the bank had estimated annual loan requirement under the President’s Rozgar Scheme at Rs7-10 billion and the “bank is fully geared up to meet this challenge.”

He said processing of loan applications had been outsourced to a private company, which at present “is scrutinising the submitted forms and this process will be completed by the end of current month.”

After the completion of scrutiny, loan approval and disbursement process would start, he said and expressed the optimism during the first quarter of 2007 there would be a quantum jump in loan disbursement under the scheme.

He said before the clean-up of NBP’s loan portfolio, percentage of bad debts was five times higher than the paid-up capital.

He said the bank had written off loans of its employees, who were affected by last year’s earthquake and financial relief was also awarded to them.

Source: The News