Friday, May 14 2010 12:52
Number of Lombard loans significant in lending market of Armenia
ArmInfo. Lending by Armenian commercial banks for Jan-Apr 2010 as compared to the same period of 2009 grew 85.6% to 222.8 billion drams on May 1 2010. In April versus March, this indicator grew 54%.
ACRA Credit Bureau told ArmInfo the commercial banks provided 235795 loans for April 2010 which was 32.1% more than for March. The number of loans provided for Jan-Apr 2010 grew 31.3%% versus Jan-Apr 2009. Experts say the number of Lombard loans against security of gold makes up nearly 40% of total loans.
The source reported that ACRA Credit Bureau has databank on 2.8 million redeemed and 681,000 current loans as well as nearly 949,000 credit histories (including 19,000 histories of legal entities and 930,000 privates) as of May 1 2010.
As of October 1 2009, there were 22 commercial banks in Armenia.
"ACRA Credit Reporting" CJSC, the first private credit bureau in Armenia, was founded in January 2004 by Credentials Inc. The shareholders of the company are the Central Bank of Armenia (10%), 17 commercial banks, First Mortgage Company, Dun & Bradstreet International LTD and other companies. All the 22 commercial banks in Armenia and most of the loan companies use ACRA's services.