MOSCOW, July 10, 2014 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- QIWI plc, (Nasdaq:QIWI) (MOEX:QIWI) ("QIWI" or the "Company") and Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development (UBRD) announced today launch of a large-scale project aimed at attracting new high-quality borrowers to the bank. On July 10, 2014 QIWI and UBRD signed an agreement under which QIWI Advertising will bring more than 20 thousands new retail borrowers to the bank in 10 months. Moreover, QIWI Advertising tools will be used to assess default risk of potential clients, level of their interest in credit offers and forecast probability of timely debt repayment.
"Lately the growth of Russian retail lending market decreased considerably, - said Vjacheslav Semenikhin, managing director, head of internet sales at Ural Bank of Reconstruction and Development. – Partly as a result of measures taken by Central Bank in order to cool the market and decrease banking system risks, partly due to high levels of consumer indebtedness. According to Central Bank, the share of overdue retail loans as of June 1, 2014 was 14% of total retail loans — the highest rate for the last three years. Obviously, it is necessary to adopt fundamentally different methods of potential client acquisition and scoring in order to reduce the share of overdue loans in banks' credit portfolios."
According to Mr. Semenikhin, partnership with QIWI Advertising will allow UBRD, one of the largest players in online loan applications purchasing, to attract only those clients who are potentially interested in UBRD offers and have a high probability of fulfilling their loan obligations fully and in a timely manner. QIWI Advertising communication channels including QIWI self-service kiosks and service-information SMS messages provide maximum audience coverage across Russia. Precise geographical targeting allows efficient informing of consumers in all regions. With the help of Equifax and QIWI Scoring targeting instruments, consumers can be clustered according to their potential default probability and interest in bank's offers, they also allow to evaluate attitude towards credit products based on consumers' payment history. Thus the target audience of any bank offer is defined by a number of characteristics and communication is exercised with maximum efficiency.
Danilo Shevchenko, commercial director of QIWI Advertising, noted that the partnership with UBRD is one on the large scale projects both in terms of timeframe, geographic coverage and number of potential clients. "For the last few years banks and micro finance companies have been successfully using QIWI Advertising instruments for promotion of their services and we now have significant expertise and technological facilities for efficient implementation of this project. UBRD is a Top 25 Russian retail bank. Thus we understand that helping UBRD to attract a large number of high-quality borrowers can be an example of game changing technology for the Russian retail loan market as a whole," – said Mr. Shevchenko.
About Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development (UBRD)
UBRD is a fast growing Russian bank with over 23 years of history, the largest bank in the Ural region of Russia and 25th largest Russian bank by total asset size (According to Banki.ru). UBRD is ranked 9-th by the number of branches (According to RBC) and is one of the Top-50 most reliable large credit institutions in Russia according to Forbes magazine. As of April 1, 2014 Bank's total assets were RUB 213 bln, total equity – RUB 17,8 bln, cumulative loan portfolio exceeded RUB 134,5 bln. UBRD has a credit rating on a national scale of "A" (National rating agency) and "B" (S&P) on international scale. UBRD network includes more than 500 offices in 68 regions of Russia from Vladivostok to Kaliningrad. Number of employees — about 7 thousand people.
About QIWI
QIWI is a leading provider of next generation payment services in Russia and the CIS. It has an integrated proprietary network that enables payment services across physical, online and mobile channels. It has deployed over 15.5 million virtual wallets, over 167,000 kiosks and terminals, and enabled merchants to accept over RUB 49 billion cash and electronic payments monthly from over 70 million consumers using its network at least once a month. QIWI's consumers can use cash, stored value and other electronic payment methods to order and pay for goods and services across physical or online environments interchangeably.