Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 6
By Huseyn Valiyev - Trend:
Azerbaijan's Xalq Bank was granted the status of an authorized agent of the State Fund for Development of Information Technologies, a source in the IT market told Trend Jan. 6.
The source said the status of an authorized agent will allow the bank to do the financing of start-up projects from the State Fund's budget.
The State Fund's budget for financing start-ups and IT-projects in 2016 amounted to four million manats. The funds for the current year will be distributed among the agents of the State Fund. Apart from Xalq Bank, Pasha Bank, Bank Respublika, Demir Bank, Rabita Bank, and Bank VTB are the State Fund's agents.
"A contract will be signed with Xalq Bank in the first half of 2016. The allocation of a credit line for the bank will be reviewed in the near future during the next meeting of the Supervisory Board of the State Fund," said the source.
To finance the projects, it is envisaged to allocate small, medium and large loans. The amount of small loans can vary from 10,000 to 50,000 manats (over three years), the medium - from 50,000 to 500,000 manats (up to five years), large - from 500,000 to five million manats (up to 10 years).
The annual interest rate on loans is five percent.
Official exchange rate as of Jan. 6 was set as 1.5626 AZN/USD.
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