Central Bank of Nigeria has said that the total credit to the economy rose to N19.54trillion as of November 2020.
CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, who disclosed this after the Monetary Policy Committee meeting, on Tuesday, said aggregate domestic credit grew by 7.61 per cent in October 2020 compared with 7.35 per cent in the previous month.
He attributed this to the bank’s policy on Loan-to-Deposit Ratio, supported by its interventions in the various sectors of the economy.
“Total gross credit by the banking industry stood at N19.54trillion as at 13th November 2020 compared with N19.33trillion at end-August 2020, an increase of N290.13billion,” he said.
When compared with N15.56trillion at the commencement of the LDR policy in May 2019, total gross credit increased by N3.97trillion, he said.
He said these loans were granted mainly to manufacturing (N738bn), general commerce (N874billion), agric and forestry (N301billion), construction (N291billion), ICT (N231billion), just to mention a few.
Emefiele said the committee noted the reduction in interest rates on loans granted by Deposit Money Banks.
As of October 2020, he said 86.23 per cent of total loans granted to over one million customers by DMBs were at interest rates considerably below 20 per cent. This was an improvement from 76.43 per cent as at July 2019, he said.
“The committee recognised the supportive developmental roles of the CBN towards addressing some of the structural issues in the economy” he said.