YEREVAN, August 10. /ARKA/. The total capital of 17 commercial banks operating in Armenia grew by 5.6% in the first half of 2020 or 47 billion drams to 891 billion drams, Executive Director of the Union of Banks of Armenia (UBA) Seyran Sargsyan said at a press conference on Monday.
“This is a very important indicator, because the amount of capital characterizes a banking sector, its abilities and capabilities to overcome crisis and stress situations. We see that during the reporting period, the growth rate has been retained,” he said.
Sargsyan said also that during this period the combined bank deposits grew to 3.5 trillion drams, while their assets to 6 trillion drams, and the total loan portfolio now stands at 3.8 trillion. drams.
He said the banks’ assets increased by 191 billion drams or 3.3%. He added the coronavirus pandemic has cut banking investments all over the world, however, against this background the credit portfolio of Armenian banks has grown by 0.7% or 28 billion drams.
According to him, lending to construction sector has grown by 17%, mortgage lending has upped by 13% and agricultural lending – by 11%, but a 5% drop was recorded in the financial sector.
“Approximately 41.5% of the loan portfolio are loans provided to individuals,” Sargsyan said. Regarding deposits, Sargsyan said that they fell by 3% or 112 billion drams. However, a study revealed that the deposits of residents increased by 19 billion drams in the first half of the year, while those of non-residents decreased by 132 billion drams or by 12.6%.
At the same time, in the first half of 2020, for the first time in 10 years, the amount of loans provided in Armenian drams exceeded the amount of loans in foreign currency.
“We see that starting from 2014 the share of loans in foreign currency has been reducing. This means that foreign exchange risks are moving from clients to financial institutions,” said Sargsyan. ($ 1 – 485.00 drams). -0-
