The slowdown in economic activity had its toll on new projects guaranteed by Kafalat, as the number of guarantees given dropped in the first 7 months of 2015. Kafalat’s guarantees recorded a 29.1% decline from 505 guarantees issued by July 2014 to 358 guarantees by July 2015 thus showing a 22.87% decrease in their value ($49.9M compared to $64.7M by last year). The average value per loan went up from $128,117 to $139,518 over the same period.
Agriculture, Industry and Tourism remain the top benefiting sectors from Kafalat with 47.49%, 34.36% and 10.61% respectively despite seeing their guarantees decrease from 250 to 170, 171 to 123 and 54 to 38 guarantees by July of this year.
As for the regional breakdown, Mount Lebanon kept grasping the majority of guarantees with a 40.50% share, followed by Bekaa (21.23%), the North (13.69%), and the South of Lebanon (12.01%). The number of guarantees in these regions decreased from 223, 100, 55, and 54 guarantees to 145 in Mount Lebanon, 76 in Bekaa, 49 in the North and 43 in the South. Beirut was the only region to see its guarantees increase from 21 to 22 guarantees.
In a more positive note, in the month of July alone, Kafalat issued 66 guarantees worth $8.1M compared to 62 guarantees worth $7.7M last year. Accordingly, the average value per project declined from $124,200 to $122,298.
Number of Guarantees by Sector up to July
Source: Kafalat