Krungthai Card (KTC), a retail lender under Krungthai Bank (KTB), is aiming for double-digit loan growth this year, even though swelling household debt and the fragile economic rebound have dented domestic consumption.
The company is expecting 10% loan growth this year, said president and chief executive Rathian Srimongkol, adding it plans to maintain bad loans at the current level of 2.4% of total credit.
Its loans outstanding at the end of last year amounted to 55 billion baht, of which 37 billion were from credit cards and the remainder personal loans.
KTC has 1.8 million credit cards and 693,273 personal loan accounts. High-income earners, those who live in provincial areas, and first jobbers are the company's main focus this year.
The aggressive expansion plan includes issuing 400,000 new credit cards and increasing its personal loan accounts by 146,000 to reach 2015 earnings growth of 10-15%.
For the credit card business, it aims to increase its high-income customers, those with at least 40,000 baht in monthly income, from 20%, he said.
The company wants 15% credit-card spending growth this year, up from 129.82 billion baht last year.
Despite the ambitious goals, the company plans to maintain its credit-card non-performing loans (NPLs) at 1.66%, well below the industry average of 2.61%.
Mr Rathian said KTC wants to keep its bad personal loans at 1.17%, compared with the industry average of 4.55%.
KTC expects to deliver 15% personal loan growth this year from loans outstanding of 17 billion baht in 2014.
"We pay attention to risk management in terms of both loan approval and debt collection, so we can control NPLs for loans. We're quite confident our personal loan growth will double the market," he said.
The company plans to expand business upcountry, particularly the cross-border provinces, to take advantage of solid growth from the establishment of Asean Economic Community late this year.
KTC kept its criteria for personal loans, requiring borrowers to have at least 10,000 baht income per month. The lender announced a 2014 net profit of 1.75 billion baht, up 36.8% year-on-year.
KTC shares closed yesterday on the SET at 83.75 baht, up six baht, in trade worth 236 million baht.