Major commercial banks resume credit lending. Banks drastically reduced their loan limits or stopped new loans themselves to manage the surge in credit loans at the end of last year.
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Shinhan Bank resumed non-face-to-face credit loans from the 1st, the first business day of the new year. From the 4th, branch credit loans will also resume. Shinhan Bank stopped mobile credit loans on the 15th of last month and credit loans at branch offices on the 23rd. KB Kookmin Bank will also lift restrictions on household loans in December. Since the 22nd of last month, Kookmin Bank has not paid over 20 million won in credit loans.
Woori Bank is also planning to resume the sale of the’Won Loan for Employees’, which has been discontinued during this month. Hana Bank is also contemplating when to resume its flagship non-face-to-face credit loan product, Hana One Q Credit Loan, which was discontinued on the 24th of last month. Kakao Bank resumed its’minus bankbook credit loan’, which had been suspended from the 17th of last month, from the morning of the 1st.
It will be the new year for commercial banks to re-unlock credit loans, and regulations on the total amount of annual household loans imposed by financial authorities will be reset. Financial authorities have urged commercial banks to comply with the total amount regulation as the rate of increase in household loans increased from 4 to 5% per year to 7% this year.
In addition, the need for banks to match year-end household loans and corporate loans was the reason for the crime of credit loans. Kookmin, Shinhan, Woori, and Nonghyup Banks decided to keep the share of corporate loans above 50% by the end of last year as a condition for early introduction of Basel 3, a new capital soundness regulation.
A commercial bank official said, “As household loans increased sharply in the fourth quarter of last year, we were unable to keep the share of corporate loans promised with the financial authorities, so we had to increase the share of corporate loans by reducing household loans.”
The door to credit loans, which had been suspended, will reopen, but strict standards are expected to apply for high-income and high-credit users for the time being. Each commercial bank decided to continue the reduction of the credit limit for high-income and high-credit users that was implemented at the end of last year. Hana Bank will also lower the credit limit for professional loans from the maximum of 150 million won to 50 million won starting on the 6th.
In an interview with Yonhap News, Yoon Jong-gyu, chairman of KB Financial Group, said, “It is expected that the handling standards for large credit loans for high-credit and income earners will become strict.”
Financial authorities are also watching credit loans for high-income and high-credit people. This is because there is a high possibility that real estate, not livelihood funds, will flow into stock investment funds. An official from the financial authorities explained, “It is the position of the financial authorities to take a close look at high credit loans, but to actively handle loans to the common people.”
Reporter Ahn Hyo-seong [email protected]