The Governor of the Central Bank of Kuwait, Muhammad Al-Hashel, affirmed that “the conditions of the Kuwaiti banking sector have become better after the two years of the pandemic, as it now enjoys more flexibility that enables it to face challenges from a position of strength.” Al-Hashel explained that "the financial statements of Kuwaiti banks for the year 2021 confirm the strength of the financial safety indicators of the Kuwaiti banking sector, in terms of capital adequacy, liquidity, asset quality and profitability, supported by positive results of financial stress tests."
He pointed out that "the consolidated budget of the Kuwaiti banking sector continued to grow to about 91 billion dinars (299.5 billion dollars) in 2021 from about 85.4 billion dinars in the previous year, thus, it reached the highest level in history, with a growth rate of 6.5 percent. Considering that "the increase in assets was driven by the positive growth rates of credit facilities balances, as the net of these facilities amounted to about 56 billion dinars at the end of 2021, an increase of 4.1 billion dinars, compared to 2020, with a growth rate of 8%."
He noted that the quality of assets is at its best ever, as non-performing loans reached a historically lowest level of 1.4 percent for 2021, compared to 2% in 2020, the abundance of provisions contributed to achieving this percentage; The banks used part of those provisions to write off bad loans.
Source (Al-Sharq Al-Awsat Newspaper, Edited)
