Lebanese Commercial Banks’ Total Assets Added 5.10% y-t-d to $262.20B in Q3 2019

According to Lebanon’s consolidated commercial banks’ balance sheet, total assets grew by 5.10% year-to-date (y-t-d), to stand at $262.20B by September 2019.

In details, Resident customers’ deposits (which grasp 50.42% of total liabilities) decreased by 2.40% y-t-d to $132.20B in Q3 2019, with deposits in LBP declining by 9.88% y-t-d to $41.88B while deposits in foreign currencies recorded an uptick of 1.51% y-t-d to 90.32B. In fact, part of the LBP deposits were converted to USD, which explains the 1.51% uptick in deposits dominated in foreign currencies. Meanwhile, the remaining LBP deposits were withdrawn out of the banking system. As for the Non-resident customers’ deposits (13.97% of total liabilities), they retreated by 2.92% y-t-d and totaled $36.62B over the same period on the back of a drop in deposits in LBP and in foreign currencies by 13% and 1.61% to $3.75B and $32.87B, respectively. As such, the dollarization ratio for private sector deposits increased from 70.62% in December 2018 to 72.89% in September 2019. Accordingly, we can estimate that the total deposits (resident and non-resident) withdrawn out of the banking system amounted $2.23B in Q3 2019. In their turn, resident financial sector liabilities witnessed an important increase by 33.26% y-t-d to $2.21B.

On the assets side, Reserves (constituting 58.47% of total assets) recorded a 17.23% y-t-d increase to settle at $153.3B by September 2019. The increase in reserves came on the back of a 17.28% y-t-d climb in deposits with the central bank (BDL). Meanwhile, the environment of high interest rates weighted on Claims on resident customers (18.09% of total assets) which retreated by 8.42% y-t-d, to stand at $47.44B in Q3 2019. As for Claims on the government, they declined by 6.11% since the beginning of the year to stand at $33.03B. In details, the subscription to T-bills in LBP and to Eurobonds recorded a decline by 4.52% and 7.35% to $16.59B and $14.86B, respectively by August 2019.

Total Assets of Commercial Banks by September (in $B)

Lebanese Commercial Banks’ Total Assets Added 5.10% y-t-d to $262.20B in Q3 2019

Source: BDL

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *