The FINANCIAL — Owners of micro and small businesses can now take out loans both for their business development and personal welfare. The new initiative of Bank Republic – loan package My Family and Business – offers credits with a 16% interest rate of up to a 10 year time period.
BR’s initiative is extremely important for this small country that is still experiencing the effects of the economic downturn. BR is among a few banks in Georgia supporting business crediting, while the majority of financial organizations have stopped this process.
The first part of the package My Family and Business implies two types of loans for business.
The first type is Fast Money, loans up to 7,000 USD in a day, with a time period of 2 years and without collateral.
The second is loans of up to 100,000 USD, a time period of 7 years and collateral being either real estate and/or movable property.
“To obtain a long-term loan from Bank Republic the individual should have been in charge of a small or micro business for at least three months.
Moreover, the documentation needed includes a plan for business development, the future missions of the company, sales forecasts, and what scale the company will cover. The necessary documentation is the same as that which banks usually request,” says Aslanishvili.
“As for the second part of the loan package – Loans for personal welfare, owners of small and micro businesses have their family and private lives too, consequently we offer them a package for the gratification of their personal needs and wishes,” says Suladze.
Bank Republic offers loans of up to 20,000 USD for the purchase of household equipment, for travelling and house repairs. Moreover, for those who want to get a loan in a day the total maximum amount is 7,000 USD.
Furthermore, the Bank offers IPO loans, a loan for purchasing or building a house or other immovable property, without unlimited maximal threshold of the loan.
Bank Republic is one of the leading banks in Georgia, employing more than 1,000 staff, serving its clients through 47 branches and service centres.
Since 2009 Societe Generale raised its share in Bank Republic and at present possesses 80% of shares in the Bank.
“Micro and small size businesses represent one of the major parts of the Georgian economy, consequently there is a high number of recruited people in this sector and in many cases they need support from banks.
The project is directed to support development and growth of small and micro businesses, and moreover, to assist those people who are employed in this sphere.
For Bank Republic the priority remains the support of business, consequently we care for people by offering new innovative products and by improving existing projects for adjusting our product to Georgian markets,” says Irakli Aslanishvili, Commercial Director of Bank Republic.
“Till this period we have been financing business only for need gratification and formed partnership with our clients for development of small and micro businesses. The decision was made to deepen relationships and consequently we decided to lend loans for personal welfare too.
While developing the loans, we try to satisfy all the needs – refilling stocks, acquisition of production material, acquisition of real estate and necessary equipment – that in the future will have great influence on business development,” says Giga Suladze, the Head of Retail Banking of Bank Republic.
“The risks associated with this business are not high. According to the analyzes we made on the bases of past years, this sector showed high resilience, stably recovering from the country’s political situation and other cataclysms,” says Aslanishvili.
“We believe that the demand for the new loan package will be high. However as we are still in the process of developing the project we still do not have the expected forecast for the number of people applying,” says Aslanishvili.
Discussion about this post