NASSAU, Bahamas—A sector stability report from the Central Bank of the Bahamas has found that the credit union delinquency ratio ended 2013 some two percentage points higher than international benchmarks. Credit unions are the second-largest deposit taker in the Bahamas, after the commercial banks, and the report notes CUs have relied more heavily on small-scale consumer loans to grow lending.
“The majority of the credit was extended for small-scale consumer purchases (72.5%), while mortgages/land purchases and revolving lines of credit accounted for smaller shares of the credit extended, at 20% and 7.3%, respectively, with agriculture, education, small and medium-sized enterprise development and other ‘miscellaneous’ loans holding the remaining 0.2%,” the Central Bank report said.