AIB eyes Central Bank’s approval to open 12 Mini Branches

The Arab Investment Bank (AIB) eyes the approval of Egypt’s Central Bank (CBE) to inaugurate 12 new mini branches, a source in AIB said Monday.

This comes among the initiative launched by the Central Bank to open mini branches.

CBE’s board of members has set new requirements for opening new mini branches by banks operating in the Egyptian market late 2014.

According to the CBE’s requirements, the banks are required to hold 5 million Egyptian pounds in capital for every new mini branch opened in Cairo, 2 million pounds for the rest of governorates, except for Upper Egypt governorates which require only 1 million pounds for each mini branch.

The source stated that AIB targets opening new 17 branches, 12 of them are mini branches, within the upcoming period; therefore, AIB will eventually have 35 branches in Egypt.

On other side, the source added that AIB has provided housing unites worth EGP 100 million among the initiative launched by Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) to fund mortgages for people on low and middle incomes.

Moreover, Arab Investment Bank has doubled its capital within the last period from 500 million to one billion Egyptian pounds.