Bank CenterCredit JSC (Kazakhstan) signed an agreement about borrowing a syndicated loan for $200 m.

/KASE, November 21, 05/ - Bank CenterCredit JSC (Almaty), whose shares and bonds are traded in Kazakhstan stock exchange's (KASE) official "A" listing category, today spread press-release saying on November 21 of 2005 about the Bank, Raiffeisen Zentralbank Osterreich Aktiengesellschaft (Vienna) and Citibank N.A. (London ) signed an agreement about borrowing a syndicated loan for a total of USD200 m. "About 35% of the loan have been borrowed for two years", - the release says. The borrowed funds will be spent for financing export-import contracts of the bank's clients. Before the warrant, signed by Bank CenterCredit JSC, presumed borrowing of up to $100 syndicated loan. However after successful main and general stages of syndication there were received bids for over $220 m. As a result the bank decided to stop on optimal amount of borrowing - $200 m. The staff of the deal comprises over 40 international commercial banks and financial organizations - ING Bank N.V., Demir-Halk Bank (Nederland), HSBC Bank plc, HVB Group, COMMERZBANK Aktiengesellschaft, Mashreqbank, Bankgesellschaft Berlin, National Bank of Egypt, Bank of Montreal, ICICI Bank Ltd. and other. This deal is the fifth syndicated loan received by Bank CenterCredit JSC from foreign creditors. "The big success is that about 30% of syndicate participants are new banks, which have not worked before with either Bank CenterCredit or other Kazakhstan commercial banks", - the bank says. This loan is the biggest borrowing in the bank's history by the amount as well as by the number of participating financial institutions, and also the biggest, which has ever been borrowed by other Kazakhstan banks, excluding "the big three". [2005-11-21]