Moscow, Russia, November 12, 2010
—IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is providing Russia’s LOCKO Bank with $50 million debt finance and advisory services to help the bank develop new financial products for clients implementing energy efficiency improvements.
The finance package consists of a $20 million loan for IFC’s own account and a $30 million loan syndicated from eight commercial banks. The IFC Advisory Services team will help LOCKO Bank develop in-house expertise in energy-efficiency lending.
“As shareholders and long-term partners, we applaud LOCKO Bank’s efforts to help address climate change in Russia and expand small and medium business finance into a new area,” said Snezana Stoiljkovic, IFC Director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia. “The syndicated loan also will introduce the bank to international banks participating in the syndication.”
“This new investment will expand and diversify our funding base and help us serve our clients better,” said Dmitry Kryukov, Chairman of the Executive Board of LOCKO Bank. ”With IFC’s advice, we will develop energy-efficiency finance and offer it to our customers as a new product.”
IFC became a shareholder of LOCKO Bank in 2006. It has a seat on the board of directors and actively participates in the bank’s strategic management.
The IFC Russia Sustainable Energy Finance Program provides a wide range of advisory services to financial institutions, their clients, and other market players to support investments in energy efficiency. The program helps financial institutions to develop local capacity in energy-efficiency lending through training, joint promotional activities, resource materials, and transaction support.
About IFC
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is the largest global development institution focused on the private sector in developing countries. We create opportunity for people to escape poverty and improve their lives. We do so by providing financing to help businesses employ more people and supply essential services, by mobilizing capital from others, and by delivering advisory services to ensure sustainable development. In a time of global economic uncertainty, our new investments climbed to a record $18 billion in fiscal 2010. For more information, visit
www.ifc.org
.
About LOCKO Bank
LOCKO-Bank is a Russian commercial bank with a strategic focus on servicing the SME sector which was founded in 1994. The Bank provides a wide range of financial services to corporate and private clients including VIP private customers. The international shareholders of the Bank are IFC with 15% stake and East Capital group (Sweden) with 11% stake. Besides Moscow offices, LOCKO-Bank currently operates 32 regional branches in the key economic regions of Russia. For more information, visit
www.lockobank.ru/eng/
.
The commercial banks participating in the syndication are:
Mandated lead arrangers: Amsterdam Trade Bank N.V., COMMERZBANK Aktiengesellschaft
Raiffeisen Bank International AG VTB Bank (Deutschland) AG.
Lead arrangers: AKA Ausfuhrkredit-Gesellschaft m.b.H.FBN Bank (UK) Ltd.
Managers: ADRIA Bank AG, Oberbank AG.
