On September 27, Balti Investeeringute Grupi Pank AS (BIG) opened its Lithuanian
branch; the branch offers loan services in the Lithuanian market under the
trademark BIGBANK.
BIGBANK started operations with four offices. The offices are located in popular
entertainment and shopping centres of Akropolis in Vilnius, Kaunas, and
Klaipeda. BIG's aim is to expand the office network to all major cities in
Lithuania. In addition to the office network, BIGBANK is also developing
electronic sales channels: phone and internet services.
The Head of the Lithuanian Branch is Maksim Melamed, who previously worked as a
Foreign Projects Manager in the parent company of the BIG group. Currently,
there are 28 people working in the Lithuanian branch. The headquarters is
located in Vilnius. In Estonia and in Latvia the company operates under
trademark of BIG, in Lithuania BIGBANK was selected as the trademark.
The area of activity of BIG's Lithuanian branch is similar to that of Estonian
and Latvian operations: fast and flexible small loans to private individuals.
According to Targo Raus, the Chairman of the Board, the market niche of BIG is
relatively vacant in Lithuania. “We believe that the Lithuanian consumer loan
market has a lot of potential. There are some loan offices focusing on small
loans, however, so far such a large bank specialised only on consumer loans,
like BIG, was missing. We estimate our potential client base in Lithuania to be
about 100 000 people”, said Raus.
The Supervisory Board of BIG decided to open a branch in Lithuania in July this
year. The branch was registered in Lithuanian commercial register on August 22.
Balti Investeeringute Grupi Pank AS (BIG) is one of the largest banks
specialised on granting loans to private persons in the Baltic countries, being
also the market leader in small loans in Estonia. BIG has 32 offices in Estonia
and Latvia, and 4 in Lithuania. The company employs close to 400 people in the
three Baltic countries. The total number of active clients is over 73 000, the
company's loan portfolio amounted to 1 600 million kroons at the end of first
half year.
The bonds of BIG are listed on Tallinn and Stockholm stock exchanges.
Additional information:
Targo Raus
Chairman of the Management Board of BIG
Phone: +372 735 0923