YEREVAN, April 7. /ARKA/. The Armenian government approved today a draft law on ratification of the intergovernmental agreement between Armenia and Russia on the purchase and sale of the Russian Federation's share in the paid-up authorized capital of the Eurasian Development Bank (EDB).

Russia lost its majority stake in the Eurasian Development Bank after the Board of the Kazakhstan-based bank approved a redistribution of member states’ shares in January 2023.

Russia’s share in the EDB was to be reduced to less than 45%, while the remainder of its shares were to be equally distributed among the other member states.

Before the decision of the bank's Board, about 66% of the EDB's authorized capital belonged to Russia, about 33% - to Kazakhstan, and 1% - to Belarus. Tajikistan, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan had small stakes.

After acquiring 64,000 shares of the EDB worth $64 million, Armenia's share in EDB is expected to amount to 4.22%," according to the Armenian government.

The authorized capital of EDB is $7 billion. Armenia became a full member of EDB in April 2009. Armenia's share in the capital of the bank is $100,000, equal to 07% of its shares. The value of each share is $1,000 (equals one vote).

Currently the volume of EDB's investment portfolio stands at $13.4 billion, of which $484.2 million were provided to Armenian government and private companies for implementation of 23 projects.

The EDB is a development bank set up by Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan in 2006 to finance big cross-border projects that integrate the economies of the member states more closely.

The redistribution of EDB shares held by Russia was approved by EDB’s shareholders and governments of the bank’s member states but it has to be ratified by member states.-0-