Wednesday, 12 November, 2008
Banks in the UAE are expected raise the minimum salary required to qualify for personal loans, says a report.
Already HSBC has raised the minimum monthly salary required for a personal loan to 20,000 dirhams ($5,445), said the Arabian Business report.
The bank had doubled the minimum monthly salary threshold on Nov. 1 from 10,000 dirhams, it said.
Earlier, HSBC raised the threshold to 10,000 dirhams from 5,000 dirhams in early October.
The report quoted Raj Madha, equity analyst at EFG-Hermes, as saying that HSBC might be trying to reduce its exposure to a section of the market that many see as overleveraged and other banks could follow suit given the current liquidity squeeze.
"We would expect banks to be less aggressive in going after loans, particularly where the returns do not necessarily match the risks," Madha said.
Source: http://www.tradearabia.com/
