Meeting with leading commercial banks’ management held at Central Bank

04-03-2020

4 March 2020, Baku: A joint meeting was held at the Central Bank with the Azerbaijan Banks Association and management of leading commercial banks on 3 March 2020 to maintain next assessment of the implementation of assignments by Mr Ilham Aliyev, the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan on activating real sector lending, preference of business loans, channeling preferential loans to development of SMEs, optimization of consumer loans and other directions at the conference dedicated to results of the first year of implementation of the ‘State Program on socio-economic development of regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 2019-2023’.

The attendees widely discussed the said issues and deeply analyzed the dynamics of business loans across the banking sector since the early year. The Central Bank additionally tasked all banks, leading banks in particular, to further intensify business loans. They also assessed effects of prudential regulatory requirements applied to promote business loans.

Meeting participants also discussed in-depth the efforts to optimize consumer loans. It was mentioned that new regulatory norms have been adopted to regulate growth rate of consumer lending in general.
Access to financial services in regions, in particular in rural areas, was also among the issues discussed at the meeting. Concerned parties should always focus on strengthening credit institutions and regulation of securitization of agro-crediting as one of the key assignments for the financial and banking sector.

In general, the participants highlighted that banking sector stability should be safeguarded as a prerequisite of successful realization of banking sector assignments to amplify financial inclusiveness of the real sector, as well as regions; improve access to resources; optimize consumer lending; and banks were accordingly assigned to take actions to strengthen internal control and increase risk management potential.