More Filipinos becoming depositors, says BSP

MANILA, Philippines–More people continue to set aside money as savings, in line with government and industry efforts to spread the reach of financial services to a larger segment of the population.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) this week said the number of deposit accounts in local banks rose by nearly a fifth between March 2012 and June 2014.

In the same period, the number of depositors that hold these accounts rose by over a quarter.

“These are clearly encouraging developments,” BSP Governor Amando M. Tetangco Jr. said this week.

“They reflect growth and a portent of opportunities while institutionalizing synergies among financial institutions and professionals,” he said.

Speaking before trust executives of local banks, the BSP chief noted that at the end of June, there were 47 million deposit accounts held by 38.4 million people.

This was up from 40.1 million accounts and 31.1 million depositors in March 2012.

As of June this year, the industry posted outstanding deposits of P7.9 trillion after growing annually by about 13 percent for five years.

He said these increases were encouraging signs that efforts toward financial inclusion, which aim to bring more people into the fold, were bearing fruit.

However, challenges remained, Tetangco said.

He said more than two-thirds, or 69.3 percent, of saving can be attributed to 20 percent of families while the bottom 50 percent of Filipino families generate just 6.2 percent of total savings.

Likewise, over a third, or 37 percent, of our 1,634 cities and municipalities in the country do not have even one banking office.

Apart from just expanding access to financial services, Tetangco also cited the role that trust executives can play in turning bank depositors into retail investors.

This way, he said money in banks can be put to better use for funding economic activity.

Tetangco said BSP-supervised trust entities can broaden their participation in the pension system by managing the employee benefit funds of private firms as well as the trust funds of pre-need companies.

As of end-June this year, only 13.7 percent of assets under management of BSP-supervised trust entities are those of employee benefit programs as well as individual retirement and pension funds.

“This is an area where improvements can be made, especially when you consider the very nature of the trust business,” he said.