According to Central Bank reports, nearly 600 crore worth of checks have been dishonored in Sri Lanka’s banking system in the second quarter of this year alone.
Business sources indicate that this situation is a reflection of the fact that many businesses have collapsed in the face of the difficult economic situation.
According to the data released by the Central Bank, 250,000 checks issued by various institutions and individuals were dishonored in the second quarter of the year, with a value of 59,600 million rupees or more than 5,960 crore rupees.
This figure shows a significant increase compared to the first quarter of the year when the number of checks that were honored in the first quarter of this year was 192,000. Among the total checks issued, 3.2 percent of the checks in the second quarter were dishonored compared to 2.1 percent of the checks that were dishonored in the first quarter, the Central Bank reports show.
During the first quarter of the year, checks worth approximately 681 million rupees were dishonored on a daily basis, which increased to a daily average of around 1 billion rupees in the second quarter.