YEREVAN, November 10. / ARKA /. The 500,000th plastic card, issued by VTB Bank (Armenia) was given to 27-year-old Ani Pashikyan, a teacher of computer science at a secondary school in the village of Saralanj in the northwestern province of Shirak.

The plastic card together with a 500,000 dram certificate was handed to Ms. Ani Pashikyan by VTB Bank (Armenia) CEO Yuri Gusev at a ceremony at the bank's head office. The amount was transferred to Ms. Pashikyan's payroll card.

VTB Bank (Armenia) has been the leading bank in Armenia for several years already by the number of active plastic cards (35% of the total Visa and MasterCard cards) and by the total turnover made by using its cards.

"The release of the 500,000th card comes to confirm that our payment cards enjoy the highest demand in the country. They  also indicate the confidence of a wide range of customers in our services," Gusev said.

VTB Bank (Armenia) is a full member of international payment systems VISA International and MasterCard Worldwide. The Bank offers its clients a wide range of standard Visa and MasterCard cards. It also serves local ArCa bank cards.

VTB Bank (Armenia) runs 67 branches across Armenia and operates 158 ATMs. Its customers can use their cards to pay utility bill, make purchases in retail outlets and in the Internet. VTB Bank (Armenia) is owned entirely by Russian VTB financial group.

At the end of the third quarter, its assets totaled 296.1 billion drams, liabilities stood at 266.8 billion drams, its capital was worth 29.2 billion drams and it had 20.9 billion drams of authorized capital having provided also a total of 185.7 billion drams lending. ($ 1 - 479.86 drams) -0-