Santo Domingo.- At the end of 2023, the Dominican bank played a fundamental role in promoting the development of the tourism sector with a credit portfolio that exceeded RD$105,500 million (US$1,824.5).
These funds were essential to finance hotel projects and associated businesses.
According to the preliminary version of the Annual Banking and Tourism Report of the Superintendency of Banks (SB), the portfolio dedicated to this sector registered a growth of 6.7% compared to 2022.
As of December 2023, tourism represented 10.6% of private commercial portfolio loans.
This segment had 20,494 unique debtors and 24,004 credits within the financial system, registering year-on-year increases of 5.5% and 7.2%, respectively.
When examining interest rates in foreign currency, it appears that tourism enjoys an annual financing cost of 7.59%, slightly lower than the 7.62% of the rest of the private sector.
In terms of risk, it stands out as the second portfolio with the lowest delinquency rate in the financial system, with only 0.17% of the debt overdue.
In addition, approximately 23.1% of the total capital owed on the tourism portfolio is secured with taxable guarantees.
This means that for every RD$1 of borrowed capital in the system, there is RD$4.3 in backup guarantees.
Consequently, credit to this sector has grown consistently, maintaining an average nominal rate of 14.2% in the last five years.
The segmentation of loans by type of currency reveals that 87.9% of the tourism portfolio is denominated in US dollars.
This constitutes 23.4% of the total foreign currency portfolio of the financial system.
Commercial banks dominate the tourism credit portfolio with a participation rate of 98%.
Furthermore, 91% of tourism financing is concentrated among the three main banks with the largest volume of assets.
The report highlights the importance of the sector in the economy, since hotels, bars, and restaurants contribute almost 6.8% of the gross domestic product (GDP) and employ 8.1% of the workforce in the Dominican Republic.