SMEs to have a chance to restructure their debts



BANGKOK, 7 June 2016 (NNT) - The Legal Execution Department (LED) is gearing up to host an event for small and medium enterprises (SMEs), which are struggling financially.

LED Director-General Ruenrudee Suwanmongkol explained that entrepreneurs who wish to restructure their debt are able to seek consultation from the department's legal experts and the Office of Small and Medium Enterprises Promotion (OSMEP) at the event.

SMEs that are unable to pay off their debt can file a court petition to restructure their debt in accordance with the 2016 Bankruptcy Act. The law was enacted on May 25, after being amended to help SMEs stay afloat. However, only SMEs that have registered with OSMEP are eligible for debt restructuring.

The LED Director-General hopes that as many as 50,000 SME operators will benefit from the amended Bankruptcy Act. The event will be held at the Queen Sirikit Convention Center on June 27.


-- NNT 2016-06-07

Their main interest is not on restructuring debts, but on how to acquire more...

What a crazy idea, and worse still it is bad economics and it smacks of a populist policy.

One would think that many of the SMEs with a debt problem are in this position because that don’t have a business plan, and would probably never be viable (regardless of how much assistance they are offered).

Providing debt restructuring is only going to cause many of these ailing SMEs to dig a deeper (debt) hole for themselves, while taking government money away from more deserving recipients elsewhere.

That's why people don't pay back loans. They wait to get bailed out, or prolong payment.

After all the cash, tax breaks and soft loans already given to SME's in 2015 and 2016Q1, here is the status of Thai SME's:

"The University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce (UTCC) has reported a slight reduction in the competitiveness of Thai SMEs in the first quarter but expects them to be more productive this year.

Mr Thanawat Polvichai, Director of the Center for Economic and Business Forecasting at UTCC, disclosed results of a survey on the SME competitiveness index for the first quarter this year, saying the index edged down to 48.4 from 50 during the same period last year.

He said the lack of improvement signified that operators were continuously affected by the prolonged drought, low agricultural product prices, soaring household debt, strict lending criteria of financial institutions and global economic slump. All the negative factors have hampered sales and revenue of SMEs while the competitiveness index is projected to slip further to 48.1 in the second quarter."

Not a government success story.

After all the cash, tax breaks and soft loans already given to SME's in 2015 and 2016Q1, here is the status of Thai SME's:

"The University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce (UTCC) has reported a slight reduction in the competitiveness of Thai SMEs in the first quarter but expects them to be more productive this year.

Mr Thanawat Polvichai, Director of the Center for Economic and Business Forecasting at UTCC, disclosed results of a survey on the SME competitiveness index for the first quarter this year, saying the index edged down to 48.4 from 50 during the same period last year.

He said the lack of improvement signified that operators were continuously affected by the prolonged drought, low agricultural product prices, soaring household debt, strict lending criteria of financial institutions and global economic slump. All the negative factors have hampered sales and revenue of SMEs while the competitiveness index is projected to slip further to 48.1 in the second quarter."

Not a government success story.

Had always thought that these SMEs are being hammered by high wages and low productivity.