Azerbaijan, Baku, March 29 / Trend I.Khalilova /
JSC "UniBank" joined the list of potential shareholders of the first private credit bureau that is going to be created in Azerbaijan, told Trend the project coordinator of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) for strengthening the financial infrastructure in Central Asia and Azerbaijan Teymur Heybatov.
Access Bank, AGBank, Azerbaycan Sənaye Bankı, Bank Respublika, Dəmir Bank, Muganbank, PAŞA Bank, Turan Bank and Yapı Kredit Bank Azerbaijan have already signed a memorandum on mutual understanding.
"Currently, negotiations are being held with several other banks, and If the agreement is reached, they will join the memorandum," Heybatov said, refusing to announce their names.
Under the terms of the memorandum, the majority of participants must agree to with accept a new member to the pool, as it was in the case of "UniBank" which was accepted by signing respective annexes to the memorandum by the other banks.
The initial volume of the authorized capital of the credit bureau has been declared to be $ 2.5 million. According to Heybatov, in case of granting the technical operator a half of the share in the Bureau, the share of each bank will constitute approximately 125 thousand dollars, which is a small amount, considering future dividends and profits that can be obtained from the resale of the shares. For example, in Italy, a private an operator of a credit bureau, established in late 80's, bought out all the bank shares at 10-20 times more expensive price than the nominal.
The international partner will become the software supplier for the bureau. Based on its experience, IF C also proposes to give the majority share in the credit bureau, be established in Azerbaijan, to those who have skills to manage it. This will reduce the risks in the credit bureau, including preventing disputes between banks on certain issues.
"In any case, all banks will have access to the services of the bureau, and no one will have additional privileges independent on whether it is a shareholder or not," Heybatov said.
Now the main task, according to Heybatov is preparation for the creation of the first private credit bureau by the entry into force a new law regulating activities of credit bureaus in Azerbaijan. Therefore, the preparation process is being performed simultaneously with the harmonization procedure of the draft law "On Credit Bureau", which is still under consideration by the Central Bank of Azerbaijan.
In 2005, formation of credit histories of debtors started in Azerbaijan after the establishment of the Central Credit Register Service (CCR) under the Central Bank of Azerbaijan. The register covers the whole spectrum of personal data about banks, non-bank credit institutions, debtors, owners of large stock packages of participation in debtors' capital, their credits and pledges on them. The credit bureau, in turn, will be able to collect credit information from other financial institutions such as leasing companies, organizations involved in micro-crediting, non-financial organizations, including communal and telecommunications companies, trading objects selling goods on credit, etc.
The objective of ACAFI project is the improvement of the infrastructure of Financial Markets in Central Asia (Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan) and Azerbaijan by creating an effective system of credit information exchange and introduction of training and certification in the field of risk management among employees of financial institutions. The project activities will help financial institutions to take more quick and correct credit decisions and, thus, will increase the availability of financial services to individual consumers as well as small and medium enterprises in the region. This three-year project is being implemented in cooperation with the Government of Switzerland.