Yerevan, June 6 /Mediamax/. Senior Vice-President of the Swedish OMX Group Henri Bergstrom stated in Yerevan today the necessity of a “revolution” on the Armenian market of capital.

Mediamax reports that the OMX Vice-President said this, speaking during the “Development Prospects of Armenian Market of Capital” round-table, organized by the Central Bank. The representatives of Armenian business participated in the round-table.

According to Henri Bergstrom, at present, the Armenian market of capital is in reanimation conditions, “when it is difficult to breathe and feed, and the heart is in bad condition”. However, he stressed, “there is will and readiness of the participants of the market to assist the process of reanimation”.

OMX Group Vice-President noted that the investors are offered a limited range of services on the Armenian market of capital. According to him, one should start from solving the problems in the sphere of infrastructures, especially in the payment-accounting system. Henri Bergstrom noted that the point is the establishment of necessary condition for free entrance of the investors in the Armenian market of capital, rather than the implementation of the system.

“We held discussions with the representatives of well-known Armenian companies, which expressed preliminary interest concerning the initial placement of securities on the Armenian Stock Exchange”, OMX Vice-President noted.

According to the assessment of Bergstrom, there are efficient steps needed to increase the interest towards the capital market of the country. One of such levers, according to him, may become the provision of tax benefits to companies, which express readiness to place their shares on the Stock Exchange.

The OMX Vice-President stated that another condition for the development of the market of capital may become the pension reforms. He noted that there are quite a few concrete examples in the world, evidencing that the basic driving force for the development of the market of capital is the pension system.

“We intend to implement in the Armenian market of capital the “quality mark” of OMX, use the best European practice here”, Henri Bergstrom stressed.

According to the forecasts of the OMX Vice-President, in 10 years “we will be dealing with an efficiently functioning Armenian market of capital”.

The Chairman of the Armenian Central Bank Tigran Sarkisian stated the importance of holding the round-table, noting that these were the first public discussion after signing the memorandum between OMX, the government and the Central Bank of Armenia, according to which OMX purchases the Armenian Stock Exchange and the Central Depository.

On May 25, the OMX Group announced its merger with the NASDAQ Company. The new Company will be named NASDAQ OMX Group.