YEREVAN, October 23. /ARKA/. The rumors going around about Inecobank’s intention to buy ProCredit Bank have been denied by both banks.
Answering ARKA News Agency’s question about whether the two banks have a sale-purchase arrangement, Anatoly Tirosyan, the deputy head of Inecobank’s administration, said that there are no information about that at the moment, but added that Inecobank is always ready to consider bank market opportunities.
“Inecobank, as one of the active participants of Armenia’s banking system, is always considering opportunities existing at market and is ready to discuss them,” he said.
Haykandukht Poghosyan, a marketing and PR specialist at ProCredit Bank, on her side, denied the rumor saying there are no agreements between the banks.
“ProCredit Bank is operating in Armenia’s banking sector, as before,” she added.
Armenia’s Central Bank has decided to raise the minimum amount of commercial banks’ total capital to 30 billion drams from the current 5 billion drams from January 1, 2017.
The banks established before January 1, 2017 will have to meet the new requirement- that is to have 30 billion drams worth total capital.
The measure is aimed at encouraging mergers and consolidation of banks, which is expected to create a sound competitive environment and make banking services more available.
Now only five of 21 Armenian banks meet this requirement. Others are searching for additional financial sources and capital replenishment means, including also shareholders, IPO or mergers. The number of Armenia’s banks may reduce to 14 or 15 by January 2017.
Inecobank cjsc was registered on February 7, 1996. Inecobank was the first bank in Armenia to start serving trade in installment.
Its assets totaled AMD 158.1 billion in late September 2015 after shrinking 1% since the beginning of the year and liabilities have shrunk 3.5% to AMD 129 billion. The bank’s capital grew 11.3% to AMD 29 billion, credit investments contracted by 6.5% to AMD 101 billion and profit for the nine months of this year amounted to AMD 3.3 billion (4.4% decline, compared with the same period a year before).
ProCredit Bank received its license from the Central Bank of Armenia on December 7, 2007. Its only shareholder is ProCredit Holding.
The bank’s assets totaled AMD 56.9 billion in Jan-Sept 2015 and liabilities AMD 47.7 billion. Its capital amounted to AMD 9.2 billion (0.8% growth) and credit investments AMD 44 billion (15.7% decline). ProCredit Bank’s profit shrank 73.3% to AMD 88.2 million. ($1 – AMD 470.07). —-0—–
