Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli hopes in attracting financial capital of the Azerbaijani bank to Georgia, Trend special correspondent in Georgia reports citing Nogaideli as stating at the Tbilisi airport prior to his departure to Brussels.
He met with the chairman of the International Bank of Azerbaijan, Jahangir Hajiyev, and outlined future plans of cooperation.
The Azerbaijani bank intends to invest some $400-500m in Georgia a year and the Georgian authorities contributes in the process, Nogaideli stated, attributing the International Bank of Azerbaijan as the biggest bank of Azerbaijan.
The Georgian Prime Minister relates the interests of the Azerbaijani bank in Georgia with the commissioning of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan main export and future activities of the South Caucasus gas pipeline.
The projects have started functioning and the establishment of the contacts with Azerbaijan is real testimony for it, he said.
Over 50% of shares of the International Bank of Azerbaijan (IBA) is owned by the government In 2005 the bank owned 50.9% of assets of the Azerbaijani banking sector ($1,257,9m), 53.48% of credit portfolio, 61.91% of deposits, 24.58% of stock capital ($90.92m) of the country. In 2006 the IBA was granted long-term Р'Р' + and individual by the international rating agencies EUROMONEY magazine conferred the IBA the Bank of Year 2000-2004, while GLOBAL FINANCE conferred the IBA the same title in the period 2001-2005 among the developing markets.