Members of the House of Assembly debated a compendium of bills on Wednesday aimed at changing the lending industry in the country.

In his contribution moving the bill Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, the Hon. Philip Davis spoke about the need for exorbitant amounts of collateral required to obtain loans.  He said, “this is especially the case for small and medium sized enterprises or as they call it small and medium sized business owners.  For example, think about the mom and pop shop, the majority of these business don’t typically own land or value of buildings, most of these businesses are housed through tenancy.  But that doesn’t mean that they have nothing of value to offer, for example, they own machinery, inventory, equipment, vehicles, accounts receivables, they may even own intellectual property that has great value.   However, our antiquated system has not recognized the diverse range of assets that represents the true value held by business owners.”

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Tourism, Investments and Aviation, the Hon. Chester Cooper told Parliamentarians the bill opens the doors by allowing banks to accept movable property as collateral.  “Consider the entrepreneur running a start up, they have an excellent idea, the skills to execute it and even a budding customer base but they go to the bank, they don’t have real estate or real collateral as the bank would say and therefore the door to their dreams are sometimes closed.  This bill reopens the doors by enabling lenders to accept movable property as collateral in a standardized and legally secure way.   Whether its a fisherman leveraging his boat in Inagua, a contractor using his tools in Andros or a small shopkeeper in Little Exuma using her inventory or even accounts receivable.”

When enacted the new legislation will establish a collateral registry.