-
IZMIR - Business Aegean Bank (BAB, a joint venture of Turkish and Greek businessmen) will open its headquarters in Athens at the end of June.
Panayotis Kotsikos, founder member and Chairman of Greek-Turkish Chamber of Commerce, stated on Thursday that BAB was established with the aim to boost trade and investment between the two countries. He said they applied to Greek Central Bank to get foundation permission.
Kotsikos said entrepreneurs showed great interest in the promotions made in Greece and Turkey, ''we have decided to raise the capital of the bank to 100 million euro upon this interest,'' he noted.
''320 entrepreneurs from various regions of Greece want to be shareholders of the bank,'' Kotsikos said, and added that, ''150 investors from Turkey, most of them from Izmir and Istanbul, applied to be shareholders of the bank. Greece will have 65 percent and Turkey will have 35 percent stake.''
''We think of opening 26 branches in both countries,'' he remarked and noted that, ''the project is the outcome of the bilateral trade volume of 2.2 billion USD last year.''
Meanwhile, Izmir Chamber of Commerce (IZTO) Executive Board President Ekrem Demirtas (who carries out establishment works of the Bank in Turkey) said the project was also supported by the Turkish government.
