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LAND
Bank of the
Philippines
has received P6.8 million in cash and P9.6 million in
stock dividends from the Small Business Guarantee and
Finance Corp. (SBGFC), the bank said in a statement.
The bank
said the dividends were earned from its shareholdings in
SBGFC from 2005 to 2007.
In a
phone interview, LandBank vice president for corporate
affairs Agustin Frederick Apilado said the dividends,
albeit small compared with others in the industry, will
be “infused” into the bank’s lending portfolio for
micro, small and medium enterprises this year, or MSMEs.
“[The
dividends] will be added to the bank’s lending. It’s
small but it’s good to know that the bank’s shareholding
is earning,” he said.
According to its web site, SBGFC is a government-owned
and -controlled corporation created to source and adopt
development initiatives for globally competitive small
and medium enterprises in terms of finance, technology,
production, management and business linkages.
It is
mandated by law to support the development of micro,
small and medium enterprises through the provision and
promotion of alternative modes of financing and
credit-delivery systems.
The
SBGFC currently uses various banking services of the
LandBank that include online-collection facility for
loan payments from SBGFC borrowers, the Payroll Credit
System using the LandBank eCard and the weAccess
Internet Banking Facility.
Its
projects in the pipeline include the distribution of
MSME Landbank eCards for micro, small and medium
enterprise borrowers to be launched in July.
The
recent enactment of the Magna Carta for Micro, Small and
Medium Enterprises, or Republic Act (RA) 9501, signed
into law by President Arroyo on May 23, is expected to
widen the credit windows for MSMEs.
RA 9501
amended the 17-year-old RA 6977, which does not include
micro enterprises.
The new
law defines micro enterprises as businesses with a total
asset size of not more than P3 million; small
enterprises as businesses with more than P3 million to
P15 million in total assets; medium enterprises as those
with more than P15 million to P100 million in total
assets.
RA 9501
also increased the capitalization of government-owned
SBGFC from P5 billion to P10 billion; and also mandated
for the allocation of credit resources of all lending
institutions for MSMEs, requiring them to lend at least
8 percent of their loan portfolio to micro and small
businesses.
SBGFC
chairman and CEO Virgilio Angelo earlier said the
mandatory lending provision is favorable to SMEs, that
were given low priority ranking by banks.
“The
mandatory lending provision of the Magna Carta is an
affirmative action in favor of SMEs, who are normally
given low priority by banks and other sources of formal
credit due to its perceived risk and cost concerns,” he
said. |
