Bangladesh Bank has given the opportunity to the banks to increase the credit card interest rate. The Central Bank has given a new instruction regarding this on Sunday (December 1). As a result, from now on, banks will be able to charge a maximum interest of 25 percent from credit card customers. So far the maximum interest limit was 20 percent. The new directive will come into effect from the first day of the new year (January 1).
In the directive, the central bank said, 'There is a directive to set the maximum interest rate on credit cards at 20 percent in order to protect the interests of customers, including providing loan facilities against the credit card limit. However, in order to ensure fair credit risk management and to keep policy interest rates in line with increasing funding costs of banks, the maximum interest rate on credit cards has been fixed at 25 percent. The credit card interest rate will be determined within this limit subject to the loan demand of the banks and the supply of loanable funds.
In this instruction of Bangladesh Bank, it is further said, 'Islamic Shariah-based banks will take necessary measures to determine the profit rate by following the mentioned instructions in the case of their investments.
It is known that the City, BRAC, Eastern and Standard Chartered Bank are at the top in credit cards. Recently, banks proposed to the governor to increase the interest rate of credit cards. In response to their pleas, the central bank has increased the maximum interest rate limit for credit cards by 5 percent to 25 percent.
