As of this January a 25% decrease in the amount of private transfers, one of the movers of economic development, was registered in Armenia, the ex-chairman of the Central Bank of Armenia (CBA) Bagrat Asatryan told reporters on March 30.

This year Armenia is likely to receive less funds than last year, so it will be a hard year for the country, Asatryan said.

Speaking of the Armenian banking system, he pointed out that USD investments have actually decreased despite the claims that they are increasing. That is, banks continue attracting credits, but they are not investing in economy as much as they did before. As a result, the banks have more funds to utilize than they actually need. Asatryan also pointed out high-level dollarization of the Armenian economy.

“The Armenian dram does not play such an important role in the Armenian economy as before, and the Central Bank’s intervention is one of the causes. The AMD supply is decreasing – 274bn AMD this March against 344bn AMD in 2008. The AMD supply has decreased by 45bn AMD over the last three months. In fact, the dram supply is not sufficient for dram depreciation, but it continues depreciating, which can be accounted for by political and other factors,” Asatryan said. Among the causes is, according to him, “flight of capital from the country”, as well as monopolized economy.

T.P.