GEORGIA’s NB TO COOPERATE WITH RA CENTRAL BANK IN ESTABLISHING DEPOSIT
GUARANTEE FUND

YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 25. ARMINFO. Georgia’s National Bank (NB) intends
to actively cooperate with the RA Central Bank in sharing experience
in establishing a Deposit Guarantee Fund, NB President Irakly
Managadze told ARMINFO. He pointed out that Armenia has surpassed
Georgia in this process by launching its Fund last July and can render
Georgia information assistance in speeding up the introduction of this
system. He forecasts that the Georgian Deposit Guarantee Fund will
start working late next year. Managadze pointed out that Armenia and
Georgian are keeping pace with each other.

The main direction of the Georgian NB in 2005 will be the introduction
of new instruments to regulate liquidity, that is, SWAP-contracts, and
the RA CB’s experience may be of benefit to Georgia. The Georgian NB
is currently regulating liquidity by interventions both on the
interbank market and on the monetary exchange, to curb inflation and
ensure price stability.

According to the NB, the turnover of the domestic currency market
totaled 3.6bln. USD and 558 EUR in 2003. The share of dollar exchange
business was 4.4% of the total volume, and that of extraexchange
business 90.3%, while the lion’s share of operations with the Euro
(98.3%) was on the interbank market. In 2003, the currency
purchase-and-sale operations of the Georgian NB constituted 1.2% of
the total volume, and 26.7% of the exchange turnover.