New Merchant Bank can facilitate local private sector growth – President Ali

His Excellency Dr Irfaan Ali said that the Guyanese-owned New Hayven Merchant Bank will help to facilitate the growth of the private sector.

The Head of State made the remarks while delivering the feature address at the launching ceremony of the new bank at the Marriott Hotel on Thursday night.

The Merchant Bank will mobilise finances for the public and private sectors and will offer services such as asset management, investment banking, wealth management, mergers and acquisitions and real estate financing among others.

During his address, the Head of State announced that the Bank will be launching a massive education programme aimed at the grassroots, micro and medium enterprise level.  

The President said that the banking licence was granted to Guyanese Floyd Haynes after more than two decades and noted that like Haynes all Guyanese need to put their collective shoulders to the wheel to achieve shared prosperity.

Haynes in his remarks stated that Guyanese must seize the opportunities available, “there has never been a time in the history of Guyana when there were more opportunities for Guyanese and Guyanese businesses”.

He also spoke of the need to get capital to finance these ventures and gave his assurance that New Hayven will look to fill that gap.

According to Haynes, New Hayven aims to revolutionise the industry.  He stated, “your typical retail bank offers debt capital, what we call loans. The Merchant Bank comes along and we can do all types of things – we can bring financial instruments that were not here before, have never been thought of or didn’t exist…so that’s why we are here, we are open for business and we are ready.”

The New Hayven Merchant Bank is located on Church Street in Georgetown.