Giorgi Shagidze, Președintele maib, într-un interviu pentru Agora

Sure, sure. Well, hi and thanks for the question. Indeed, this is a very exciting event and it will be Moldova Romania Capital Bridges on the 13th of September. The event will be opened by a very high-level delegation. There will be the Prime Minister of Romania, Prime Minister of Moldova, President of IBRD, and other high-level guests. And then there will be three panels: panel one about Moldova to EU, panel two about macro and economy in Moldova, and panel three about the companies in Moldova. This event will be crucial for how Moldovan companies can get access to very interesting capital markets in Romania, which will be very important for the Moldovan economy and business development in the future.

Well, the event is designed to invite potential and current investors to Moldova, invite very important, successful, and relevant investors who can consider investing in Moldova, and then explain to them why they should invest or consider investment in Moldova either today or in the future. And clearly, one of the big reasons why international investors can consider investing in Moldova is related to the potential candidacy or membership of Moldova into the EU. This is a very big upside for the Moldovan economy and Moldova's development in the future.

Well, each panel includes respective, relevant, and important speakers, and these speakers know very well how to explain to the audience the importance of the respective direction. So, for example, the panel about EU membership of Moldova includes the EU ambassador, includes the head of the budgetary committee of parliament, Mr. Dumitru Alibaba, includes the Deputy Prime Minister, as well as investors. The panel about macro includes the head of EBRD office in Moldova. The panel about the companies includes various CEOs of different Moldovan banks and companies. So each panel will have these speakers who can explain on the ground real experience and important points to the audience. And again, this is designed so that people understand why they should consider investing in Moldova today or in the future.

Indeed, MAIB is one of the organizers of the event along with the Bucharest Stock Exchange and other important partners. And by the way, I would like to use this opportunity and thank the Bucharest Stock Exchange and all the partners for giving us a chance to organize this very important event. MAIB, being the largest bank in the country, when it's trying to explore its opportunities to list its shares on international stock exchange, will have the opportunity to act as the gateway of bringing new investors into the country, as well as act as an example to present an exemplary company from Moldova so that it can present developments in the country to international investors. The investors that are considering or looking to invest in Moldova can accept the investment risk, and if that happens, these investors will be very familiar with the country, then the next company from Moldova can easily approach them to offer their investment. So MAIB has a much bigger role than just listing its shares on the international market.

Well, thank you. This is a fair question. And of course, we are facing some uncertainties in the region related to geopolitics and related to the economic situation and so on. Nevertheless, I think it is important to highlight that Moldova has many advantages, and we need to explain it to the investors. The fact that the country already has EU candidate status is already a big step forward. The fact that, if we speak for example about the banking sector, the penetration in the banking sector is quite low, this is important to explain to the investors. Last year the economy grew by 14 percent, and this is in real terms, this is important to explain, and so on. So the event is not designed to bring investors today, but it's more to position the country correctly and to start the dialogue with the investors so that they know more about the advantages that the country has.

Well, I think there are many things that we can share, but perhaps I can say from the initiatives that we are doing in MAIB. We are going through huge transformation and we have many initiatives, and again, they can be grouped into four groups. Number one is what we are doing in the bank is we are putting the customer in the center of everything we do in the bank. This is a very big statement, sometimes it is used for marketing purposes, but I think in our case it means transforming how we are transforming the relationship with the customers. You see new branch, a new model, how we are serving the customers. This means brand refreshment in our case, changes in the processes, procedures, most importantly changes in the corporate culture. The second is our initiatives in the digital world. In digital, we are upgrading our traditional digital banking channel, and on top of it we are launching a new so-called digital ecosystem so that every time the customer wants to do something in digital space, it is next to us. The third one is again listing our shares on an international stock exchange, and this event clearly is one of the milestones of our initiative to do so. And number four, it's important we know that up to one million Moldovans have EU citizenship, and we want to go and serve these people with digital products and services. So that would be our main strategic pillars. If I may, we will be building our bank in the medium to long term. These are ambitious plans, and I wish you all the best.