May 22, 2017, 00:23 / Finance

Sberbank began issuing credit cards to young people under 25 from May 1

The bank found 300,000 potential borrowers Anna Eremina

Sberbank has found 300,000 potential borrowers: it will issue credit cards to those under 25 years old / E. Razumny / Vedomosti

From May 1, Sberbank reduced the age requirements for clients to receive a credit card from 25 years to 21 years. Igor Kovalev, executive director for credit card development at Sberbank, told Vedomosti about this.

After 2014, Sberbank temporarily stopped issuing credit cards to borrowers under 25 years of age in order to prevent a decline in the quality of the portfolio. In 2015, the segment under 25 years old had the largest share of clients with overdue loans - 32.6%, according to statistics from the United Credit Bureau (taking into account Sberbank data).

Before returning to such a risky segment, Sberbank carried out a pilot project since August 2016. To do this, he sent out an offer to 200,000 clients under 25 years of age with a permanent place of work to apply for a card. The response was 40% higher than in the 25+ segment, says Kovalev. Perhaps this is due to the fact that pent-up demand has been realized, Kovalev argues, but young people are ready to take out credit cards. A prerequisite for obtaining a loan is a constant source of income; Kovalev refused to list other parameters for selecting borrowers. “The need for various types of benefits among young people is great, even greater than among adults. Consequently, their demand for loans is quite high,” says Frank RG CEO Yuri Gribanov.

Young people do not apply for high limits, which, on the contrary, repel them, Kovalev assures. The limit for the pilot project was 15,000 rubles, which is a small limit, he admits. The quality of the formed portfolio turned out to be even better than in the 25+ segment, Kovalev assures, but does not provide data.

Now the bank can offer young clients a limit of over 15,000 rubles, says Kovalev, if they comply with payment discipline. Based on the results of the pilot , Sberbank has created an offer for another 100,000 people with a permanent source of income and will expand the audience, he promises. In total, Sberbank has 13.5 million active credit cards, according to its materials. People “from the street” can also apply for a credit card from a bank. Sberbank also issues other types of unsecured loans to people under 25 years old, a bank representative indicated. If the client came to the bank young, then the bank has the opportunity to build long-term mutually beneficial relationships with him, says a representative of HKF Bank (the bank lends to borrowers up to 25 years old).

At VTB and VTB 24, a client can apply for a loan from the age of 21 if they have permanent employment and at least three months of experience at their last place of work, says a representative of the VTB Group. And he emphasizes that the share of young clients under the age of 25 among credit card holders is about 10%.

Tinkoff Bank uses a large array of data to evaluate a borrower and age is one of the variables, a bank representative points out. Data suggests that clients become more reliable as they age, he notes, but this does not exclude the possibility that Tinkoff may approve a loan to a young applicant starting at 18 years old. From the same age, Post Bank also lends, says bank board member Svyatoslav Emelyanov, the limits depend on the client’s income and his risk profile: age, credit history and debt load.

"OTP Bank" issues loans to clients from the age of 21, because it considers this segment to be promising: at this age, clients are already more actively using non-cash payments, Internet and mobile banking, and are open to everything new, says Roman Lobusev, head of the center for the development of credit products of OTP Bank . According to Kovalev, non-cash purchases and payments account for up to 85% of turnover in the segment from 21 to 25 years.

Renaissance Credit issues credit cards to those who have already reached 21 years of age, says its vice-president Grigory Shabashkevich. And he adds that banks consider the segment of young borrowers to be high-risk - they approach their obligations less responsibly.

However, in the first quarter of this year, the share of those borrowers under 25 years of age grew the most – by 0.4 percentage points to 5.2%, according to data from the National Credit History Bureau. The most unpopular segment is the 65+ category, which accounts for 4.1% of borrowers.

Corrected version. The original published version can be viewed in the Vedomosti archive (smart version)