जोखिम लगानीकर्ताको, फाइदा सरकारलाई

 बैक तथा वित्तीय संस्थाको आर्थिक वर्ष २०७७-०७८को अपरिष्कृत वित्तीय विवरणअनुसार गत आवमा बैकहरुले ९०.८८ अर्ब रुपैयाँ सञ्चालन नाफा कमाएका छन् । जसमा सरकारलाई तिर्ने विभिन्न प्रत्यक्ष करलगायत काटेर ६३.३७ अर्ब खुद मुनाफा छ । तर, उक्त नाफाबाट लाभांशको रूपमा लगानीकर्तालाई करिब ४८.५८ अर्ब वितरित भयो । त्यसमध्ये पनि करिब ४१.२५ अर्ब बोनस सेयर रहेको छ भने नगद लाभांश भनिएको ७.३३ अर्बबाट लाभांश कर कटाउँदा लगानीकर्ताले करिब ४.९ अर्बमात्र पाए ।

यसरी तथ्यांक हेर्दा बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थामा जोखिम मोलेर लगानी गर्ने प्रबद्र्धक तथा साधारण सेयरधनीले भन्दा सरकारले बढी प्रतिफल पाउने गरेको पाइन्छ ।

तर, बजारमा भने बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थाले धेरै नाफा कमाए । महामारीमा पनि बैंकहरुले कसरी नाफा कमाए भन्ने इष्र्यामिश्रित आश्चर्यका प्रश्नहरु सबै बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थाहरुमाथि उठिरहन्छ । जसका कारण नाफा कमाउनु नै अपराध हो कि भनेझैं मान्यता स्थापित गर्न खोजिएको देखिएको एक बैंकरले कारोबारलाई बताए । ‘नाफा नगरे कसरी सरकारलाई कर बुझाउने अनि जोखिम मोलेर लगानी गर्ने ? लगानीकर्तालाई के दिने ?’ उनी प्रश्न गर्दछन् ।

तर, के बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थामा प्रबद्र्धकदेखि साधारण सेयरधनी लगानीकर्ताले बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थामा जोखिम मोलेर लगानी गरेबापत अचाक्ली नै प्रतिफल पाएका छन् त ?

मानौं, कुनै बैंकले १०० रुपैयाँ कुल नाफा कमायो, उसले पहिला त्यो नाफाबाट १० रुपैयाँ कर्मचारीलाई बोनस छुट्याउँछ । त्यसपछि बाँकी ९० रुपैयाँमा सरकारलाई ३० प्रतिशत कर बुझाउँछ, जसमा २७ रुपैयाँ हाराहारी जान्छ । त्यसपछि १०० रुपैयाँ कुल नाफामा ६३ रुपैयाँ चानचुन बाँकी रहन्छ । त्यो ६३ रुपैयाँबाट एक प्रतिशत सामाजिक उत्तरदायित्वका लागि छुट्याएपछि बाँकी ६२.२७ नाफा सिद्धान्ततः लगानीकर्ताको हो । तर, व्यवहारमा भने नेपाल राष्ट्र बैंकले तोेकेका अन्य नियामकीय तथा प्रुडेन्सियल बैंकिङको लागी चाहिने विविध रकम फेरि त्यो करिब ६३ रुपैयाँबाट छुट्याउनुपर्छ । त्यसपछि मात्रै लगानीकर्ताले जोखिम मोलेर गरेको आफ्नो लगानीकोे प्रतिफल पाउँछन् । सरकारले पाउने अझ लाभांश कर तथा ब्याजकरलगायतको अप्रत्यक्ष करको हिसाब गर्दा जोखिम जति लगानीकर्तालाई तथा फाइदा जति सरकारलाई हुने व्यवसायलाई नेपालमा बैंकिङ भनिन्छ ।

किनकि, बाँड्न मिल्ने प्रतिफलबाट पनि बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थाको जोखिम कम गर्न एवं अन्य नियामकीय व्यवस्थाअन्तर्गत नाफाबाट केही रकम अझै छुट्याउनुपर्छ । जुन रकम बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थालाई बलियो तथा जोखिमरहित बनाउन हो । तर, पछिल्लो दुई वर्षमा राष्ट्र बैंकले नगद लाभांशलाई दुरुत्साहन गरेपछि बोनस सेयरको नाममा नाफा पुँजीकृत हुँदै गएको छ । एकातिर नाफामा नै संकुचन आउनु अर्कोतिर राष्ट्र बैंकले व्यवस्था गरेअनुरुप बोनस सेयर थपेर पुँजीकृत गर्दै जानुपर्ने बाध्यताले पनि बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थालाई आफ्नो व्यवसाय विस्तार गर्न दबाब बढेको छ ।

पछिल्लो वर्ष बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थाले आक्रामक कर्जा विस्तार गर्नुमा बोनस सेयर पुँजीकृत गर्नुपर्ने बाध्यता तथा अन्य क्षेत्र सुस्ताएका कारण बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थासँग लगानीयोग्य तरलता बढी भएर हो । नेपाल बैंकर्स संघका निवर्तमान अध्यक्ष भुवन दाहालका अनुसार गत आवमा कर्जा विस्तार हुनुमा बजारमा अत्यधिक लगानीयोग्य तरलता रहेको हो । तर, लगानी बढे पनि हरेक वर्ष बैंक तथा वित्तीय संस्थाका लगानीकर्ताले पाउने प्रतिफल भने घट्दै गइरहेको उनको भनाइ छ ।

Central bank lowers refinancing loan limit

The central bank has reduced the maximum limit of refinancing loans that businesses can take from refinancing facility through banks and financial institutions (BFIs) to Rs 50 million per individual, and per business.
Issuing a ‘Refinancing Guidelines’ today, the central bank lowered the maximum limit of refinancing facility to businesses and individuals from Rs 500 million to Rs 50 million to ensure that more businesses have access to the subsidised loan facility. More the businesses get this facility to cope with the impact of coronavirus pandemic, faster the economy can bounce back, according to the central bank. “The businesses and individuals can now borrow Rs 50 million refinancing loans from BFIs at low interest rate of up to five per cent.”
The provision that compels every bank branch to release at least five subsidised loans and bring down the limit of such loan to borrowers will help more borrowers to access the refinancing loan facility, the guidelines reads, adding that the businesses can get up to Rs 200 million refinancing loan at five per cent interest rate from the central bank’s refinancing fund.
Earlier, the central bank had prepared a draft of the Refinancing Guidelines and brought down the limit of refinancing loan for individual and businesses to Rs 100 million. But the central bank – after the Monetary Policy for the current fiscal year – has further reduced the limit to Rs 50 million to ensure access to maximum number of businesses and people. “Refinancing loan that businesses acquire from BFIs and central bank will have maximum maturity period of one year with no renewal condition,” it reads.
The BFIs should give Covid -affected businesses top priority, when issuing such loans, while people with low income and those from marginalised sections should be given priority, the guidelines further reads, adding that small and medium enterprises (SMEs), industries that use domestic raw materials and those contributing to substitute import should also be considered eligible for such loans.
The central bank can float up to Rs 200 billion refinancing loan in the market as per necessity. Likewise, some 70 per cent resources of the refinancing fund will be mobilised through BFIs, though central bank itself had been mobilising refinancing fund.
The new provision, however, bars firms with return on equity (RoE) of more than 20 per cent annually from such refinancing loan facility. Industries related to tobacco and liquor are also barred from such refinancing loan facility from the central bank and BFIs.

Finance Minister invites businesspeople to invest in Nepal

Finance Minister Dr Yubaraj Khatiwada has invited businesspeople to invest in Nepal as the country has created business friendly environment. Giving examples that all the foreign firms operating in Nepal have been making up to 25 per cent return on equity (RoE) against the global average of 10 per cent, he said that Nepal is a better option for investors.
Speaking at a session during the Nepal Infrastructure Summit 2019, the finance minister also informed that Nepal is in the process of conducting sovereign credit rating to facilitate businesses in the country. However, he acknowledged that the government has not been able to give due priority to the infrastructure sector due to lack of enough resources as the incumbent government also has bigger responsibility of ensuring social security of citizens.
“The Constitution has guaranteed more than 30 fundamental rights to the people and majority of them are related to social security,” he said, adding that the government also has to ensure availability of resources – administrative – to all 761 governments across the country. “The government is, therefore, promoting the support and investment from the private sector for desired economic goals and development aspirations of the country.”
Ample investment in the infrastructure, including roadways, railways, airways and the tourism infrastructure, will ensure easy entry of the private sector in the development process, he added. “Along with this, the government is seeking private sector’s support also to diversify and minimise risks.”
According to Khatiwada, a few infrastructure projects could also be operated in business model to attract private sector’s investment.
Likewise, former chief executive officer of Investment Board Nepal (IBN) Radesh Panta said that the country today needs quality investment for which the government should ensure necessary subsidy packages and coordination with investors.
World Bank vice president Jingdong Huo, on the occasion, said that the multilateral development partner has been contributing the private sector-oriented economic development in Nepal. According to Huo, the World Bank has been operating 25 projects in Nepal at present, while $2.6 billion worth of new projects have been initiated in Nepal recently. “The majority of economic indicators of Nepal today are satisfactory,” he added.
Likewise, chief executive officer of NMB Bank Sunil KC informed that banks have been investing almost 20 per cent of their loan portfolio in the infrastructure sector. “Of the total, majority of the investment is in hydropower and renewable energy,” KC added.
Though Nepal needs huge investment to achieve targeted economic growth rate, he lamented that the financial sector is often witnessing the crunch of loanable funds. “In such a context,” he urged the government to facilitate banks to bring in funds from offshore markets.
On the occasion, president of Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nepal (ICAN), Krishna Acharya said that ‘accountability’ is the primary challenge facing the country at present. He also highlighted the necessity of effective coordination between the government, private sector and the financial sector for development of infrastructure in Nepal.

Central bank brings base rate to help financial institutions

The central bank has asked commercial banks to calculate the base rate — as reference rate — for lending on the basis of five indicators; cost of fund Cash Reserve Ratio (CRR) — that is also called the liquidity ratio as it seeks to control money supply in the economy — Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR) — operational cost and return on assets (RoE).
It has also provided a modality to calculate the five indicators for the uniformity of the banks to ensure the stability of monetary market in the volatile situation as the interest rates are fluctuating and could hit the sustainability and long term stability of the financial system, according to the central bank.
Though, the central bank has set different formula to calculate administrative cost and cost of maintaining capital reserve ratio and statutory liquidity ratio, it has fixed return on assets at 0.75 percent for all.
If the regular calculation of the base rate during the volatile interest rates is maintained, the financial system could be string, the central bank added.
The central bank was all set to introduce base rate on lending before Tihar to provision interest rate regime transparent.
Base rate is the minimum interest rate that banks should charge on lending.
Once in place, banks would not be allowed to extend loans to borrowers below the base rate.
The central bank had initially planned to introduce the provision before Dashain but it was delayed due to various reasons, including Nepal Bankers’ Association (NBA) opinion. The central bank had formally announced to introduce base rate.

The long-awaited provision is expected to make credit pricing more transparent.
It is now mandatory for all commercial bank to fix lending rates based on base rate. They have to publish the base rate within mid-January before implementing it. The base rate will set the floor for credit rates and gives borrowers a basic idea on how cheap they can get credit for.

Banks' share price correction fails to lure investors

The banking sector that is the key player in the share market in terms of volume and returns till date, is correctly priced, if one goes by the average price-to-earnings ratio (PE ratio) of the listed banks, though they might not be able to pay the return compared to last few years.
The average PE Ratio — that measures the price paid for a unit of share relative to the annual net income or profit earned by the company per unit — of the listed 25 banks stands at 17.60 times, which is the correct pricing. "It stood at 19.55 times in the second quarter of the last fiscal year."
Similarly, the PE ratio under 10 means the stocks are underpriced. "But the current average PE ratio that stands at 17.60 times means that the banks shares are correctly priced but they may not be able to pay dividend cheque, compared to last few years as other indicators do not support," said share market analyst Rabindra Bhattarai.
The investors should buy the stocks that have high return on assets and low price-to-earnings (PE) ratio, he added.
Return on assets (RoA) — that reveals how profitable a company's assets are in generating revenue — has come down to 1.21 per cent in the second quarter of the current fiscal year from last fiscal year's same period's 1.75 per cent.
Similarly, the low PE ratio has not been able to make the investors feel comfortable as other key indicators of the listed banks' like earning per share, return on equity, capital adequacy ratio, cost of fund and non performing assets could not ensure equal dividend cheque compared to the last fiscal year.
The measuring rod of the rate of return on shareholders' equity of the common share holders, return on equity (RoE) has also come down to 11.54 per cent this fiscal year's second quarter from last year's same period's 17.17 per cent. It also revealed banks' efficiency at generating profits from every unit of shareholders' equity.
Similarly, the earning per share — that is the amount of earnings per unit share — came down to an average of Rs 19.68 per unit in the second quarter of the current fiscal year compared to Rs 25.98 per unit in the same period of the last fiscal year, which means the shares could not earn as much as they earned thus the investors will also get less return.
Similarly, the non performing assets (NPA) — that compels banks to make loan loss provisioning hitting their profits — has increased to 3.24 per cent from last fiscal year's second quarter's 2.49 per cent, which means the investors will get less dividend next year. Some banks non performing assets have reached to the highest accepted level by the central bank, which will ban the banks to open new branches after they cross the minimum NPA level.
However, the capital adequacy ratio (CAR) has seen increase to 14.04 per cent from the last fiscal year's second quarter's 13.59 per cent. The increase in capital adequacy ratio — that is a ratio of a bank's capital to its risk to ensure that it can absorb a reasonable amount of loss and complies with statutory capital requirements — shows further growth possibility of the banks through lending, which has contracted lately.
The central bank data revealed that the banks have Rs 29 billion liquidity till March 12. The high interest rate has made the private sector shy away from borrowing despite banks sitting on surplus liquidity.
The banks have been unable to lower the interest on lending due to high cost of fund, which has increased to 8.38 per cent from last year's same period's 7.39 per cent. The cost of fund that is interest paid on deposits has also forced the banks to lower new deposit rates.
The industry average not only helps the investors to take informed decision while buying shares but also help compare the players within the sector on where they stand.


Listed banks’ indicators
Indicators — Unit — This Year Six Months — Last Year Six Months
Cost of Fund — per cent — 8.38 — 7.93
CAR — per cent — 14.04 — 13.59
RoE — per cent — 11.54 — 17.17
RoA — per cent — 1.21 — 1.75
NPA — per cent — 3.24 — 2.49
EPS — Rupees — 19.68 — 25.98
PE Ration — times — 17.60 — 19.55*
(*Machhapuchhchhre Bank (150 times), Kist Bank (84 times) and Sanima Bank (84 times) are omitted while calculating PE Ratio as their much higher PE Ratio could distort the overall PE Ratio average. The indicators are an average of 25 listed banks only. Source: SRCS)