Some Nigerian Deposit Money Banks (DMBs) are pushing for unsecured lending, a loan that does not require collateral, as demand rises among small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and households.
As seen in the latest data from the Central Bank of Nigeria(CBN), demand for unsecured lending has been on the rise but lower than the demand in the pre-COVID-19 years.
The CBN’s latest consumer credit report shows that demand for unsecured credit cards lending rose to 9.4 index points in the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2020 from 4.9 points in the first quarter of the same year.
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BusinessDay’s visit to some agency banking operators reveals that one of their challenges is on how to get loans without interest to expand their businesses.
“If we can get cash in terms of non-interest loans from the bank, it will help me to meet the rising demand for cash by my customers,” a woman (Mrs Lawal) who sells drinks in addition to PoS operations, told BusinessDay on Tuesday.
However, here are some of the banks that offer loans without collateral as seen in their websites. They include Access Bank, which offers up to N10 million without collateral to SMEs; Fidelity Bank (N10m), First Bank (N10m), GTBank (N30m), Polaris Bank (N10m), Standard Chartered Bank (N20m), Union Bank (N50m), and Zenith Bank (N10m), among others.
“Whether you are a school owner, a health practitioner or you are into IT, or any other business you can access up to N10 million without collateral,” according to the banks.
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Standard Chartered Bank recently launched a product known as Smart Business Loan (SBL), a non-secured lending product, targeted at supporting the growth of SMEs, David Idoru, head, consumer, private and business banking, noted.
“At Union Bank, we support your whole value chain of suppliers and buyers with short-term loans for SMEs that are key and sub-distributors,” the bank stated.