Standard Chartered Bank recently launched a product known as Smart Business Loan (SBL), a non- secured lending product, targeted at supporting the growth of SMEs. David Idoru, head, consumer, private and business banking, explains more in this interview with Hope Moses-Ashike. Excerpts:
Can you give us a brief description of this product?
IT is a Smart Business Loan (SBL) and is targeted at SMEs. It is a non- secured lending product.
For now, we do a lot of lending to small businesses, but they are secured lending products. We wanted to close a gap as most new clients don’t have security or collateral.
So, for a first loan, you should be able to take a business loan to finance your business operations up to N20 million without security.
If you want to borrow above N20 million, that’s when we’ll ask for collateral but below N20million, we’ll check your ability to repay.
What we are really interested in is loans to support business growth because business plays a very big part in the economy. We want to support many more businesses to succeed as part of our support to the growth of the economy in Nigeria.
What factors influence the launch of this product at this time of Covid-19?
The influence is the desire to support businesses to grow. Our purpose as a Bank is driving commerce and prosperity. This is why we exist as a Bank. COVID has made it much more important to support businesses to succeed.
Standard Chartered Bank has been operating for 150 years through good and bad times. So, for us, we look at activities beyond just the instance of COVID-19. With or without COVID-19, we take a long-term view that is why we have decided to introduce SBL.
Aren’t you considering the current economic challenges and the ability to pay back?
During the COVID-19 pandemic, there are businesses that are doing extremely well, for example businesses that support telecommunications companies. Through good or bad times, there are businesses that actually do well.
We take a long-term view to supporting businesses. We don’t cut any product just because of a particular instance. We have also accelerated our investment in technology.
We encourage our clients to do a lot more using our digital channels.
With Smart Business Loan, who is your target market?
Our target market is small businesses and must be those involved in trade. We are a bank that supports trade; these are companies that do trading or supplying of goods and services to other companies. We are keen on supporting them to do more.
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