The value of cleared checks fell 7.76% during H1 of this year, which might be due to lower business spending, and the fact that people are possibly substituting payments via checks with various payment cards and e-payments. In fact, the number of checks cleared by Banque du Liban amounted to 6.18M worth $37.23B by June 2015, compared to a larger number of 6.39M checks valued at $40.36B recorded a year earlier.
Checks in foreign currencies were the main reason why the total value of cleared checks plunged, as they decreased by 11.08% to $27.90B compared to $31.38B by June 2014. On the contrary, the value of checks denominated in Lebanese Pounds progressed by 3.89% to reach $9.33B. In turn, the dollarization rate of checks retreated from 77.75% to 74.94%, over the same period.
The value of returned checks constituted 2.13%, or $794M of the total checks, compared to 1.77% in H1 last year.
In the month of June alone, the value of cleared checks declined by 4.36% from June 2014 to stand at $8.38B. The value of checks denominated in foreign currencies (representing 81% of the total) went down by 6.31% y-o-y to $6.79B. In contrast, the value of checks in LBP augmented by 4.94% to $1.59B.
Value of Cleared Checks Y-o-Y by June ($M)
Source: ABL