| Jakarta, April 6 (ANTARA) - Banks have not yet responded to calls from various quarters to cut their interest rates on credits because interest rates on deposits are still high.
Various quarters have urged banks to cut their interest rates on credits in order to help stimulate the real sector in the current economic crisis.
However, banks appear to be still unable to lower their rates despite the fact that Bank Indonesia (BI/the central bank) has aggressively cut its benchmark interest rates (known as BI Rate) several times by a total of 150 basis points to 7.5 percent since January this year.
Banking observer Kostaman Thayib said banks had no intention to slow the lowering of the interest rates of their credits but were waiting for the decline in the interest rates of deposit which at present were still at an average of 12 percent.
"Big customers still ask for high deposit interest rates that pose a problem for banks to lower credit interest rates," he said here on Monday.
He said that many banks still fixed deposit interest rates above 12 percent for their customers despite the fact that BI had called on them to cut their credit interest rates soon following its policy to cut its BI Rate recently.
Bank Indonesia's Board of Governors in a meeting on Friday last week decided to lower the central bank's benchmark rate by 25 basis points to 7.5 percent.
The lowering on Friday of the BI Rate was the forth of its kind the central bank has taken since January 2009. In the past three months, BI has aggressively cut its benchmark rate by 150 basis points (1.5 percent) to 7.5 percent.
BI Deputy Governor Hartadi A Sarwono said the lowering of the BI Rate was in line with the downward trend of inflation in the country. "There is still a room for the benchmark rate to go down in the future," he said.
BI will continue to take expansive policies in an effort to boost the development of the real sector. The economic growth is estimated at 3-4 percent and inflation at 5-7 percent in 2009.
In light of the BI Rate cuts, Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KADIN) Chairman MS Hidayat asked the country's banks to lower their interest rates and called on the central bank BI to intervene in the matter.
"Kadin asks banks to lower their interest rates because the present rates hamper the real sector's activities," Hidayat said here Monday, adding that he had also officially asked BI to help make his request a reality.
High interest rates will not bring about positive value for the real sector's growth in Indonesia," he pointed out.
He appreciated BI's efforts in cutting its reference rates several times so that the rate now stood at 7.5 percent.
But he also said the BI's initiative would be useless if the national banks did not immediately reduce their interest rates, adding that ideally the disparity between bank interest rates and the BI rate should not exceed four basis points.
"At present, private-owned banks have set their interest rates at an average of 16 percent, and this is not efficient," Hidayat said.
Earlier, economic observer Tony A Prasetyantono said banks should cut their interest rates on credits this month after the central bank had slashed its key rate four times in the past four months.
"After BI's latest key rate cut whereby it is now 7.5 percent, large banks that have enough liquidity should reduce their interest rates on deposits and later the interest rates on credits. I think they can start doing it this month," he said.
The interest rates on credits had to be cut to avoid non-performing loans. Following the weakening of public's purchasing power banks are potentially facing increasing non-performing loans. One way of curbing it is through cutting the interest rates starting from savings interest and then credit interest.
In the meantime, state-run Bank Mandiri's retail and micro-business director, Budi Gunadi Sadikin, said the cut by 25 basis points of the BI rate to 7.5 percent could drive bank credit interest to drop.
"Yes, I think so. Only that it will be stronger if the rate drops again later during the auction of Bank Indonesia Certificates (SBI)," he said.
The director of CIMB-Niaga Bank, Chaterinawati Hadiman, said the drop in the BI rate could be one of the factors that would help reduce credit interest.
"It could become one of the factors for it although several other factors also had to be accounted for such as liquidity condition and credit risks," she said.
Based on the central bank's data from the end of December 2008 to the second week of March 2009 the credit interest had dropped only by 0.05 percent while BI Rate had dropped by 200 basis points.
According to Kostaman Thoyib, the lowering of the interest rates of banks' credits is only a matter of time. Yet, when it will happen still needs to be wait and see.
He said that the interest rate could not be reduced by a low rate of the BI benchmark alone but also by a cut in the funding cost which at present was still high and pose a burden on banks.
"We are convinced that if the interest rate of deposit goes down below 10 percent, the interest rates of banks' credits will also follow soon," Kostaman Thoyib said. ***2*** (T.A014/A/HAJM/20:30/A/H-YH) (T.A014/A/A014/A/H-YH) 06-04-2009 21:22:00 |
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