MANILA, April 4 -- The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said the proportion of non-performing loans (NPLs) of Philippine banks to their total loans settled reached 3.44 percent as of February this year.

BSP data released late Wednesday showed that the ratio during the month was the same as the NPL ratio recorded in January this year.

It was, however, higher than the 3.31 percent in February last year.

The gross non-performing loans amounted to PHP466.11 billion, higher than the PHP460.7 billion in January this year and the PHP411.18 billion recorded in February last year.

In a comment, Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation chief economist Michael Ricafort said the year-on-year increase in the NPL was partly due to higher interest rate...