Nearly 30 years after the first merchant bank was licenced in Guyana, the New Hayven merchant bank has been launched with the promise to help small businesses secure much-needed finance and to aid the country’s transformation agenda.
The licence was granted to the United States (US) based Guyanese, 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.
At the launch of the bank on Thursday night, 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 explained.
But this merchant bank, he posited, will help to ease these woes.
A merchant bank, essentially, mobilises finances on behalf of entities such as corporations. It engages in loan, fundraising and underwriting services.
Haynes assured the large gathering at the Marriott Hotel in Kingston, Georgetown, 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 too, touting the legitimacy and commitment of the new bank.
President Dr. Irfaan Ali hailed the investment as a crucial part of Guyana’s development, noting that it is the first banking licence granted after more than two decades.
The Guyana Americas merchant bank, the country’s first merchant bank, was established in 1995.
Now with the country undergoing an unprecedented phase of development, President Ali said that the addition of this bank will prove beneficial.
The Head of State also said that the company must not only think about securing much-needed financing for the private sector, emphasising 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.
“… the cost of capital is critical,” President Ali said.
