March bank lending drops for fourth month

BANK lending in March fell for the fourth straight month compared to a month earlier, though consumer loans grew slightly in the period.

Loans through the domestic banking unit - which essentially captures lending in all currencies but mainly reflects Singapore-dollar lending - stood at S$601 billion in March, preliminary data from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) showed on Thursday.

This dipped 0.4 per cent from S$604 billion in February, compared with the fall of 0.6 per cent in February.