KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 2 — Malaysian banks are facing lethargic growth in loans issued and a possible rise in their own credit costs from adopting a new accounting standard this year, said CIMB Equities Research when maintaining its neutral outlook for the sector.
It said loan growth has continued to slow from 4.6 per cent year on-year at the end of October 2017 to 3.9 per cent year on-year at the end of November 2017.
“However, the trends in November 2017’s leading loan indicators were the strongest so far this year.
“The industry’s loan applications and approvals grew by 15.8 per cent on-year and 22.3 per cent in November 2017,” CIMB said in its note.
The research house then said it expected the growth rate to stabilise or possibly improve for December.
