Baku, Azerbaijan, Oct. 9
By Azad Hasanli - Trend:
The Azerbaijan Micro-Finance Association (AMFA) offers the Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA) to start direct lending to non-bank credit organizations (NBCOs), chairman of the AMFA, a board member of Aqrarkredit NBCO Suleyman Kalashov told reporters Oct. 9.
"Under the law, NBCO cannot directly receive loans of the central bank, and they mainly attract funds of banks," he said. "However, the cost of credit is high. In addition, non-banking credit organizations cannot attract deposits from the public, that is, the sources of their funding are limited."
Kalashov went on to add that the CBA recommended banks that their actual annual interest rate on consumer loans not exceed 29 percent, and micro-credits - 25 percent.
"It is difficult to reduce rates on micro-credits," he said, stressing that in this regard, the NBCO should get cheaper loans. "Many people take loans, for example, worth 500 manats, but the maintenance costs for micro-credits are very large, especially considering the cost to evaluate the pledge and so on. As a result, this leads to the fact that the NBCO work to their detriment."
The official exchange rate on October 9 is 1.0478 AZN / USD.
Edited by CN