Friday, March 15 2019 16:50

ArmInfo.Armenian banks are drastically raising assets and liabilities. According to the  Financial Rating of Banks of Armenia as of December 31, 2018,  prepared by ArmInfo, the share of AMD obligations for 2015-2018  increased from 25.4% to 41%, while the share of currency obligations  decreased from 65.2% to 58.4%, which is similarly affected assets -  the share of the dram component increased from 32.6% to 48.7% while  the currency component decreased from 55.4% to 49.6%.

In the structure of assets, the volume of the dram component  increased in 2018 by 17.1%, and the currency component - by 10.9%,  which almost equaled them - 2.4 trillion and 2.5 trillion drams,  respectively. The prevalence of the dram component over the currency  growth is also observed in the structure of liabilities - 20% versus  11%, but despite this, there is still a significant gap between these  articles - 1.7 trillion and 2.5 trillion drams, respectively.

In assets, this picture is due to the dramatization of the dominant  item - credit investments, in the structure of which the volume of  dram loans sharply accelerated growth to 34.6%, reaching 1.3 trillion  drams, while modest growth of foreign currency by 6.2% to 1.8  trillion drams. As a result, the share of the dram component in  credit investments was tightened in 2015-2018 from 24.3% to 40.4%  while the share of foreign exchange decreased from 64.2% to 55%.

Banks, naturally, in order to achieve this goal, they likewise acted  with liabilities, the structure of which was dominated by (66.7%)  funds attracted from customers (time deposits and pre-claims). Thus,  in the structure of liabilities, the share of dram funds attracted  from customers for 2015-2018 has increased from 14.4% to 26.5%,  reaching 1.1 trillion drams, while reducing the share of currency  from 43.5% to 41.3%, reaching 1.7 trillion drams

For 2018, the dynamics of growth in the volume of dram and foreign  currency funds attracted from customers turned out to be almost the  same - 11.2% and 11.3%, respectively, which, compared with the trend  of the previous year, indicates a slowdown in the growth of dram  deposits (from 28%) decline (1.2%) in growth.

More impressive growth in 2018 was recorded in the share of 26.2% in  liabilities, funds attracted from banks and other financial  organizations: drams - by 50.5% to 523.3 billion drams and foreign  exchange - by 10.5% to 539.6 billion drams, against the decline  recorded in the previous year in both cases. This almost equaled  their share in liabilities - 12.5% dram and 12.9% foreign exchange,  while in previous years the share of foreign currency borrowings from  banks / financial organizations prevailed significantly (almost 20%  in 2015).

Such a change in the structure of assets and liabilities summed up  the currency risk indicators in 2018 as follows: the AMD net position  grew by 10.6%, while the net currency position declined by 10.7%,  thereby ensuring the growth of the total net position by 10.2%. The  dram continues to dominate in the final net position (98.5%).

According to the data from ArmInfo FinRating, as of January 1, 2019,  the total assets of the banking y-o-y growth by 14.6%). In the  structure of assets, the share of credit investments was 65.4% or 3.2  trillion drams (y-o-y growth by 13.8%). In liabilities, the time  deposits increased by 4.5% to 1.8 trillion drams, demand liabilities  - by 23.5% to 1.02 trillion drams, and funds raised from banks and  other financial organizations - by 11.4% to 777.6 billion drams.

To note, 17 banks have been operating in Armenia since 2017. In  2015-2016, four banks left the market by merging with four existing  ones. (The dram estimated exchange rate as of December 31, 2018 was  483.75 AMD / $ 1).