Baku, Azerbaijan, May 25
By Azad Hasanli - Trend:
The consolidation process in the banking sector of Azerbaijan has already started, Chairman of the Board of VTB Bank (Azerbaijan) Yuri Yakovlev said in an interview with The Business Year magazine.
"The central bank is trying to consolidate the banking sector and the requirement for minimum aggregate capital has been increased within the framework, which amounts to 50 million manats as of January 1, 2015," he said. "The expert opinion is that 25-30 banks will be left here [on the banking market of Azerbaijan] in 2015. For such a small country 45 banks is too much."
He said that in Azerbaijan every bank tries to be universal, but it is difficult and after some time, banks will no longer be competitive.
"There could be ten universal banks, but it would be more natural if the remainder of the banks had sectoral specialization," he said.
Yakovlev also said that VTB Bank needs to have 20 branches to be cost-effective in Azerbaijan. Today the bank is represented in the country by 12 branches and the Office of customer service at the head office.
Bank VTB (Azerbaijan) OJSC is a subsidiary of VTB Bank OJSC. The shareholders of VTB Bank (Azerbaijan) are Bank VTB OJSC and AtaHolding OJSC.
Bank VTB (Azerbaijan) OJSC renders services to clients of corporate business, small business and private clients.
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