Foreign investors will buy out government stake in commercial banks of Uzbekistan, First Deputy Prime Minister of Uzbekistan Timur Ishmetov said.
“Banks are commercial organizations and should bring profit. Many banks forget about that. Particularly, government-owned banks got accustomed to receiving public funding. The situation has changed now. The government won’t provide funding to the banks anymore and will reduce its stakes in banks. A certain amount of shares will be sold to foreign investors,” Timur Ishmetov said.
The International Finance Corporation plans to buy a part of the government stake in the Ipoteka Bank extending $30-40 million loans. Representatives of IFC will be then included into the Board of the Bank. This way Corporation will help development of corporate governance. In future, the International Finance Corporation will buy 15% of shares of the Bank in exchange for provided credit, the First Deputy Prime Minister said.
The central bank of Uzbekistan plans to revise the crediting system, saying the previous system of soft loans slows down development of commercial banks.
