Woman appointed head of HSBC Bank Armenia for the first time

Tim Slater thanked the participants in the ceremony for successful cooperation and said that he is leaving Armenia for Argentina where there are also many Armenians.

For his part, Deputy Chairman of the Central Bank of Armenia (CBA) Vache Gabrielyan thanked Tim Slater for his work, especially for the hard work done over the period of the global economic crisis, congratulated Astrid Clifford on her appointment and expressed hope that her activity in Armenia will be successful and fruitful.

The new CEO of HSBC Bank Armenia Astrid Clifford said that last year was hard for Armenia because of the global crisis. However, optimistic approach inspires hope for good prospect. Clifford hopes that HSBC Bank Armenia will continue its successful cooperation with all local structures.

Astrid Clifford has held executive positions in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, Oman, Dubai, India, the United States, the UK. Her last post was country director for insurance at HSBC's Dubai branch. She is bachelor of psychology and master of economics.

According to HSBC Bank Armenia, in 2009 the bank earned net profit worth 1.661bln AMD, the accumulated profit totalled 9.251bln AMD, the capital grew by 10.5% to 17.144bln AMD, the authorized capital by 3.1 times to 7.557bln AMD, the assets by 11.5% to 135.811bln AMD. The share of credits in the assets made up 75% or 101.835bln AMD - 37.5% more than in 2008. The obligations grew by 11.6% to 118.7bln AMD, the time deposits by 19% to 41.397bln AMD. The shareholders of the bank are HSBC Europe B.V. (70%) and Wings Establishment (30%).