Thai Credit Guarantee Corporation (TCG) will provide its loan guarantee service through its bank partners' e-wallets as part of a strategy to help around 3 million small merchants access loans from financial institutions, said president Sittikorn Direksoonthorn.
He said that these small merchants, such as street vendors, have extreme difficulty in accessing such loans.
In the past it had been difficult bringing some groups of people into financial institutions' loan systems. But over the past three years, digital technology has made it easier to help people access credit, Mr Sittikorn said.
According to TCG's survey of loan demand in Chiang Mai, the small merchants in the province have applied for smaller loans, on average around 30,000-50,000 baht per person, a significant reduction from an average of 120,000 baht per person in its previous survey.
Mr Sittikorn added that this indicates that small merchants only need modest amounts of liquidity to run their businesses and survive the hardships brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic, instead of the huge loans usually needed for business expansion.
TCG will share its findings with the banks so that they can adjust their loan packages to fit customers' actual needs.
Mr Sittikorn added that several financial institutions are now looking to provide credit for underbanked groups.
Last year TCG provided guarantees to 220,000 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in all categories, of which 72% were in the vulnerable group which had trouble obtaining loans from financial institutions.
TCG's outstanding guarantees stand at 1.3 trillion baht. Its guarantees have helped around 740,000 SMEs access loans from financial institutions, which have generated economic activity of around 5.7 trillion baht.