Azerbaijan, Baku, June 4 / Trend, E. Aliyev /
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has notified its partner banks and the Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA) about its commitment to participate in the process for consolidation of the country's banks, head the EBRD office in Azerbaijan Neil McKain told Trend.
"If we receive relevant proposals, we will readily consider them," the head of the EBRD representative office said.
According to the decision of the Central Bank of Azerbaijan dated July 25, 2012, the minimum total capital of existing banks has increased from the current 10 million manat to 50 million manat. The new requirement for the capitalization of banks comes into force in January 2014.
As part of the capitalization process, the Central Bank encourages banks to combine their healthy assets.
According to McKain the banking sector of Azerbaijan has achieved much, but there is still a lot of work to be done.
"The situation on the financial market of the country is good, but it does not mean it needs no improvements," McKain said.
According to the head of the EBRD representative office, the bank is involved in ten projects implemented in Azerbaijan in the real and financial sectors in 2013.
"We are working on projects in the areas of agriculture, building materials, food processing and others," McKain said.
There are 43 banks operating in Azerbaijan, of which 22 are formed with participation of foreign capital.
According to the Azerbaijani Central Bank, the total assets of banks in the country as of May 1, 2013 amounted to 18.979 billion manat, or 28.7 percent more compared with the same period of 2012.
The official exchange rate on June 4 is 0.7846 AZN/USD.