KIEV, Ukraine, Aug. 19, 2008 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Ukrainian banking business is heterogeneous. Among this diversity, a special interest cause the banks to aim aggressively at increasing their market share. Such strategy is vividly demonstrated by UkrGasBank (http://www.ukrgasbank.ua/eng).
For the last six months bank net assets increased 18%. As in the whole banking sphere such increase occurred at the expense of crediting. According to the National Bank of Ukraine information, the amount of credits granted by UkrGasBank during the first six months of 2008 increased 21.4%. During the same period UkrGasBank increased its credit portfolio 28%.
In the period of present international financial crises a number of Ukrainian banks suffered and are still suffering a lack of resources to continue their activities at their former amounts.
One of UkrGasBank's advantages is its mobility and a possibility of quick re-orientation to the internal sources of funding. It is this fact that is considered to be a guarantee of stability in the present economic situation. For the last period UkrGasBank not only preserved its position in the market of retail crediting but also significantly strengthened it (the volume of retail crediting increased 1.5 times for the last six months). In spite of the high tempo of credit portfolio increases, the Bank's policy is characterized by balanced and conservative approaches to credit risk levels.
As a result UkrGasBank has one of the best credit portfolio quality indicators in the market. Risks covering with formed reserves in the volume of 4.5% from the general credit portfolio volume is a preventative measure of a fast-growing portfolio.
The result of the bank balanced strategy is its significant share increase in the banking services market of Ukraine. The strategic plans also foresee UkrGasBank's entry as one of the top ten Ukrainian banks and a market share increase to more than 3%. Quite demonstrative is the bank profit increase in conversion to one share of a financial institution. For the period of 2005-2008 this figure grew by three times. Today UkrGasBank clients are more than 100,000 natural and 18,000 legal persons. As for salary projects, we serve more than 320,000 people.
The most important indicator of UkrGasBank development is its regional network expansion -- 19% from January till July. As for dynamics of its development, UkrGasBank is among the first three best Ukrainian credit-financial institutions. Today UkrGasBank has about 400 sales desks.
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