Black Sea Trade & Development Bank (BSTDB) will make available a US$3mn revolving trade finance facility to Inecobank (Armenia) to advance sub-loans to Armenian import/export companies.

The operation supports the bank’s strategy to finance business involved in regional trade.

BSTDB’s facility will be used for financing exports from Armenia or imports of goods from the Black Sea region.

Inecobank is the second BSTDB financial intermediary in Armenia, following a similar financial facility of US$3mn provided earlier to ACBA-Credit Agricole Bank. With the signing of this operation, the total amount of BSTDB’s approved operations in Armenia amount to US$35mn.

Inecobank was established in 1996 as a private bank and maintains strong ranking in the Armenian banking market. 10% of its capital belongs to IFC, with another 13.5% owned by ShoreCap, an international investment company founded by the Asian Development Bank, IFC, FMO (Netherlands), FinnFund (Finland) and reputable international commercial banks.

Inecobank has developed good experience in SME lending area under credit lines provided by the World Bank, Eurasia Foundation, USAid financed programmes, KfW (Germany) and EBRD credit lines.