This year the Belarusian bank Belarusbank plans to float up to $500 million worth of eurobonds, Nadezhda Yermakova, Chairwoman of the Board of Belarusbank, told a session of the general meeting of shareholders on 25 March.

“This year we plan to float up to $500 million worth of eurobonds for up to three years,” said Nadezhda Yermakova.

The official stressed that at present market conditions are not exactly favorable for such an operation. “But we hope that the situation will not last the entire year,” she said. Nadezhda Yermakova also said that the bank was not going to borrow resources at a high premium.

Speaking about the overall development of international cooperation between Belarusbank and foreign credit and finance institutions, Nadezhda Yermakova said that cooperation develops successfully. Last year Belarusbank signed credit agreements with banks of Switzerland, Germany, Poland, and France. For the sake of financing investment projects of Belarusian companies 79 credit agreements worth an equivalent of a total of $529 million were signed in 2010. The biggest of them are the credit agreements for the purchase of electric freight locomotives for Belarusian Railways, the construction of the second wing of the Victoria Hotel, and the purchase of manufacturing equipment for the Mozyr woodworking enterprise.

Last year the volume of credit facilities granted to Belarusbank by foreign banks via interbank operations rose to an equivalent of $1.38 billion.

Over the last five years Belarusbank’s shares in servicing the country’s foreign trade rose by 80% to reach 28% in early 2011.