Armenia Issues Savings Bonds

Here's the scoop:

The Ministry of Finance and Economy of Armenia will issue on January 16 state savings coupon bonds with 7% bond-equivalent yield per year.

...the volume of the bonds will make 100mln AMD.

The bonds will be available for purchase only for natural persons and only in the centers of the Treasury of the Armenian Ministry of Finance and Economy. The term for free sale of the bonds is established till April 6 of 2007 inclusive. The coupon payments will be realized quarterly. The retirement of bonds will take place on July 16 of 2007. On January 16 the bonds will be sold at the price of the face-value, afterwards - with an extra charge to the face-value.

AMD 100,000,000 is about $270,000. It will serve as a great introduction to bonds, investing, and hopefully increase faith in important institutions.

Source: Mediamax

Armenians Love Banking!

One of Armenia's biggest problems is people's lack of faith in certain institutions, especially banking. One can hardly blame them, of course. But now, there may be signs of change.

The number of people who got Armenian banking system's services has grown 8,663 over October 2006 to 768,539, National Statistical Service says. Of them, 39,473 were legal entities and 729,066 individuals. As of October 31, 929,503 accounts were registered in Armenian commercial banks, of which 872,019 were individuals' accounts. Armenian Savings Bank has 3,469,465 clients.

As I've said before, I can disagree with a lot of things taking place in Armenia at the moment, but I can't deny that progress is being made on a daily basis.

Source: Arka