The FINANCIAL — The Russian-Georgian war has badly affected many local businesses and Elit Electronics, a local retail sales net, is one of those casualties. Since the hostile activities in the conflict regions occurred the company has suffered related direct and indirect losses.
According to Eter Kokoladze, Head of the Sales Department of Elit Electronics, direct effect includes a destroyed store located in Tamarasheni, full of goods, the loss of which making GEL 550,000. There is also a damaged store in Gori, where losses amount to GEL 20,000.
“While war operations were ongoing there was serious decrease of our sales, trade at that time was not stable,” Kokoladze told The FINANCIAL.
In her words, losses incurred during the 15 days came to GEL 120,000 a day, totalling GEL1,800,000. Post the 15 day war situation period losses have made GEL 80,000 a day.
“In such a critical situation as this it’s very important and necessary for businesses to take out banking credits, which help the business stay afloat. We are currently debating the matter,” she added.
As Kokoladze noted, in spite of this situation the company is mobilized and ready to cut economical tension in the country.
“The company continues working to its usual schedule, also our partners are standing by us and together we will offer our clients lots of novelties,” Kokoladze said.
Several Georgian banks have branches located in the regions of conflict. The FINANCIAL inquired further in to the damage they had faced.
According to Maia Dzirkvelishvili, PR manager of TBC Bank, they had no concrete material losses. The bank had only one outlet in Gori which was insignificantly damaged. A window was broken and two computers were stolen, also the sunglasses of an employee. This branch was closed at the time so there were no valuables or money there to be stolen.
“Over the past weeks we’ve not suffered any financial losses,” Philipp Pott, General Manager of ProCredit Bank Georgia, told The FINANCIAL.
“We’ve been quite lucky as I just saw recent photos of our Gori branches and it seems that there’s been no significant damage to any of them, just some broken glass on the second floor. In this sense, the damage in terms of our fixed assets was close to zero,” he added.
According to Pott, It’s too early to talk about the impact this crisis will have on the bank’s loan portfolio.
“The information we receive from our branches is that in all the regions of Georgia, with the exception of Gori again, the bank’s activities are absolutely fine and most of our clients have no problems with their loan repayments,” he added.
According to Bank of Georgia, they have suffered no significant losses in the conflict region.
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