GEORGETOWN, Guyana – President Irfaan Ali has hailed the launched of the Guyana’s first merchant bank in nearly 30 years, as a crucial part of the country’s development.
President Ali addressing launch of first merchant bank in Guyana in 30 years.The New Hayven merchant was launched on Thursday night and President Ali said that with the country undergoing an unprecedented phase of development, the addition of this financial institution will prove beneficial.
He said that the company must not only think about securing much-needed financing for the private sector, emphasizing that the government too needs access to low-cost financing to help fund its massive projects.
“In making capital available, we have to ensure not only accessibility,” he said, adding “the cost of capital is critical”.
The New Hayven merchant bank is promising to help small businesses secure much-needed finance and to aid the country’s transformation agenda.
The license was granted to the US-based Guyanese national, Floyd Haynes, who has served on Guyana’s local content advisory panel and leads the cost recovery audit team for ExxonMobil’s activities in the prolific Stabroek Block.
Haynes said that new financing and new financing services are needed as Guyana develops and capital is crucial to fund the government’s aggressive transformative agenda across the country.
“When I looked at where we are as a country and where the President wants to take Guyana…it is patently obvious that there is a huge capital gap or money.
“In other words, there simply isn’t enough money to finance the transformation and development of this country in country,” Haynes said assuring the audience that the New Hayven bank will be able to secure the finance and capital needed to help small and medium-sized businesses and help fund Guyana’s infrastructural development.
The bank’s chief executive officer, Kurt Kristo, who also spoke at Thursday’s launch, said that the services include asset and wealth management, investment banking real and estate solutions.
“We are Guyana’s merchant bank,” Kristo said.
