ARMENIA’S CENTRAL BANK DEFINED 7.25 PER CENT REFINANCING INTEREST RATE

ARKA
May 15, 2009

Yerevan, May 15, Noyan Tapan. Armenia’s Central Bank Council reduced
the refinancing interest rate by 0.25 percentage point to 7.25
per cent.

As the CB public relation department reported, the council of the
central bank stated 3.2 per cent of price growth was recorded in April
of 2009 against March, the price growth within 12 month reached 3.1
per cent.

The Council of the CB stated that current inflationary developments
are mainly relevant to the directions for the forecasted period.

According to the CB PR department, since the second quarter of 2009
the inflation pace, as expected, began to accelerate. However, the
inflation pace will not surpass the upper target within forecasted
period.

Concurrently, further inflation tendency will be conditioned by
indirect impact of the rate increase for main utility services within
this April. In addition to it, the inflation growth will be affected
by continuing process of price adjustment for imported goods, which
started due to dram devaluation in the beginning of this March.

GDP rate, lower than balanced level for the forecasted period, and
outer deflation environment soften the influence of the mentioned
factors on the regular level of prices.