Kuwait approves Credit Bank capital hike by $933 mln to $10.9 bln
The Government of Kuwait has agreed with a parliamentary committee on increasing the capital of Kuwait Credit Bank by 300 million dinars ($993.31 million) to 3.3 billion dinars ($10.9 billion), the finance minister, Abdulwahab Mohammed al-Rushaid, said on Tuesday.
The government has also given the go-ahead to reschedule 500 million dinars ($1.65 billion) in bonds owed by the bank to the Kuwait Fund for Development, the minister said.
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The parliamentary proposal had aimed to increase the capital of the Credit Bank by 750 million dinars in order to finance housing units for Kuwaiti citizens.
The state-run Kuwait Credit Bank currently provides interest-free loans to eligible citizens to build, buy or renovate housing, but it has been suffering from a lack of liquidity due to the increase of housing requests.
Spending is to fall 4.8 percent to 21.9 billion dinars, with capital expenditure accounting for 13.2 percent of that sum, according to a Bloomberg report.
Kuwait will also not transfer 10 percent of the total revenue to the Future Generations Fund, or sovereign wealth fund, under a 2020 law barring such transfers in deficit years, reported Bloomberg.
However, according to a Reuters poll of 25 economists, “all six economies in the Gulf Cooperation Council would grow faster this year than was expected three months ago.”
Saudi Arabia was predicted to top the list with growth of 5.7 percent, followed by Kuwait and the UAE with 5.3 percent and 4.8 percent respectively, according to the same Reuters report.
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