Bank Permata leads Rp 330b syndicated loan for Trihamas

Mid-sized lender PT Bank Permata Tbk. (BNLI), partly owned by Standard Chartered and three other lenders, agreed on Thursday to extend a Rp 330 billion (US$36.96 million) syndicated loan for consumer financing firm PT Trihamas Finance.

Roy Arfandy, Permata’s director of wholesale banking, said in Jakarta that Permata had acted as the lead arranger of the syndicated loan.

He said Permata, Pembangunan Daerah Jawa Barat dan Banten Tbk. (Bank BJB) and PT Bank Pembangunan Daerah DKI Jakarta (Bank DKI) would respectively give Rp 100 billion to the syndicated loan, while PT Bank ICBC Indonesia would give the remaining Rp 30 billion.

Trihamas, a mid-sized financing firm focusing on commercial, public transportation and used vehicles, wanted to expand its financing to between Rp 2 trillion to Rp 2.2 trillion this year, up 6.95 percent to 17.65 percent from 2011’s Rp 1.87 trillion, said Ronny Effendy, Trihamas’ president director.

“To help achieve the target, this year we have planned to open 11 new branches and start expanding into a new market. But still, the basis would be financing for commercial and public transportation,” he said in his speech at the signing ceremony for the syndicated loan on Thursday.

Trihamas, which has 46 branch networks in Java, Bali, and Sumatra, would need between Rp 33 million and Rp 400 million in investment to open a branch, Ronny added.

In addition to bank loans, Trihamas also planned to issue Rp 200 billion medium term notes this year to finance expansion plans, he added.

Trihamas targets a 30 percent increase in assets and net profits respectively to Rp 3 trillion and Rp 91 billion.

Roy said the four banks agreed to up the value of syndicated loans to Rp 330 billion from the previous plan of Rp 300 billion because they trusted Trihamas. “Other than accommodating financing demands in a large amount, risk management will be better as risks are shared between the participating banks in the syndication,” he said in a press statement.

Roy targeted Permata to be the lead arranger for five syndicated loans this year, up from three syndications last year, to boost corporate loan growth at 15 to 20 percent to between Rp 34.5 trillion and Rp 36 trillion in 2012.

“It’s in line with the bank’s overall lending target,” he added. Permata’s lending grew 39 percent in the January-September period of 2011, higher than the overall banking industry’s 25 percent loan growth.

Permata, which had total assets of Rp 92.6 trillion as of September last year, booked Rp 962 billion in net profit during the period ending September 2011, up 23 percent from the same period of the previous year.

Permata’s shares soared 5.22 percent on Thursday’s trading to close at Rp 1,410 apiece, compared with the broader stock index’s slight 0.54 percent gain.