The Central Bank of Kuwait (CBK) has denied a report published in Local Daily about bad debts of laid off expatriates.

The Central Bank of Kuwait said that it “assures that all the figures contained in that report are altogether incorrect whether at the level of numbers of debt classification, and that it had not published any data or information in this regard, except what is published in its quarterly statistics as part of its reporting on indicators of the financial soundness including the non-performing loan ratios that reveal a significant improvement of a meager 1.4 percent, which proves the financial soundness and strength of the Kuwaiti banking sector.”

The statement continues: “Furthermore, the data published by the Central Bank of Kuwait in this regard do not relate to the bad debts owed to banks or financing companies by a specific category of customers.

Earlier a local daily reported that the total amount of bad debts for expatriates during the past four year reached $1.8 billion and part of the bad debts are for the foreigners who were laid off by the government. The report also added that 85 per cent of those debts are owed to local banks, while the remaining 15 per cent are owed to financial facilities companies. The report also said that Kuwait’s Kuwaitisation efforts has created a problem as thousands of laid off expatriates are unable to fulfill their financial obligations towards local banks.

However, the Central Bank of Kuwait also called upon the press and media agencies to exercise caution when speaking on any information attributed to the Central Bank of Kuwait since publishing any false or misleading information may adversely affect the financial and economic conditions of the country.