Prime Minister Askar Mamin holds session of Council of Eurasian Development Bank

Prime Minister Askar Mamin chaired a videoconference session of the Council of the Eurasian Development Bank.

Plenipotentiary representatives of the bank’s shareholders attended the meeting: from Armenia – Deputy Minister of Finance Armen Hayrapetyan, Belarus – Minister of Finance Yuri Seliverstov, Kyrgyzstan – Minister of Finance Baktygul Zheenbaeva, Russia – Minister of Finance Anton Siluanov, Tajikistan – Minister of Finance Fayziddin Kakhhorzoda.

Opening the meeting, Askar Mamin thanked Andrey Belyaninov, who had left the office of the EDB Chair of the Board the previous day, for fruitful work, wishing success to the newly appointed Head of the Bank Nikolai Podguzov.

During the meeting, the Council approved the Regulation on the EDB Digital Initiatives Fund. The goal of the new Fund is to assist the member countries of the Bank in the development of tools and practices for digital transformation by integrating their information resources and participating in the development and financing of projects, including those being implemented as part of the Guidelines for the digital agenda of the Eurasian Economic Union until 2025.

In accordance with the best practices of international development banks, a Human Resources Committee has been created under the EDB Council, the regulation on which was approved as part of the Council meeting.

The Council summed up the work of the Eurasian Development Bank in 2019 – the current EDB investment portfolio increased by 25.6% to $4.3 billion. The balance sheet portfolio grew by 31% to $2.8 billion. The countries with the largest shares in the portfolio are Russia (45.7%) and Kazakhstan (40.1%).

The industry structure of the current investment portfolio at the end of 2019 has not changed – the largest share is occupied by projects in the energy sector (21.1%), transport (18.9%), and the financial sector (18.7%).

In 2019, agreements were signed on 27 new projects for a total of $1.3 billion. The Bank actively developed its presence in all participating countries and, taking into account the current strategy, financed national development projects and projects with significant integration effect.

The share of integration projects in the Bank's portfolio exceeded the target value and reached 54.4%. The total borrowing volume of the Bank amounted to $2.6 billion. In 2019, the EDB placed five bond issues in Kazakhstan tenge for a total of 80 billion tenge, five bond issues in Russian rubles for a total of 23 billion rubles, as well as a secondary placement of Eurobonds for $201 million

Given the significant growth in the investment portfolio, the EDB was able to maintain its quality at the proper level. The share of provisions in the balance sheet decreased in 2019 from 3.2% to 2.4%. According to the results of 2019, the Bank's profit amounted to $68.9 million. Return on capital – 3.8%.

Of great importance for the development of investment activity in Kazakhstan is the signing of an agreement with the National Bank of Kazakhstan, which allows the EDB to attract funding with a limit of 200 billion tenge.

International rating agencies praised the financial stability of EDB: Standard & Poor's upgraded the bank to BBB, Moody’s affirmed Baa1, and Fitch assigned a rating of BBB +.

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