Taiwans Outstanding Revolving Credit Declines

Chung Hui-chen, deputy director of Bureau of Monetary Affairs (BMA) under FSC, attributed the shrinkage to banks actively promoting small-amount loans and writing off non-performing credit-card loans. The same FCS statistics showed that the outstanding revolving credit extended by credit-card issuers has grown month by month since 1998. The figure amounted to NT$407.3 billion (US$11.98 billion) in January, and rose steadily to NT$487.19 billion (US$14.33 billion) in September. However, it shrank by 8% or NT$39.99 billion (US$1.18 billion) to US$447.2 billion (US$13.15 billion) in October. Banks posting larger declines in outstanding revolving credit were mainly those with large card-issuing volume, high credit-card transaction value, and high outstanding revolving credit. In October, Taishin International Bank witnessed a sharp fall of NT$25.66 billion (US$754.7 million) in such credit, the highest among the credit-card issuers and accounting for 64% of the total drop. In terms of profit performance in credit-card business, the top three banks were Chinatrust Commercial Bank, Taishin, and Citibank, recording earnings of NT$1.22 billion (US$35.88 million), NT$810 million (US$23.8 million), and NT$720 million (US$21.18 million), respectively, in October.