GEORGETOWN, Guyana, CMC – The chairman of the DDL Group of Companies, Komal Samaroo, says Demerara Bank has opened a subsidiary in St. Lucia, taking advantage of legislation in that Caribbean country allowing financial institutions to focus on investment banking.
“We do have a subsidiary in St Lucia, but that is for investment and looking at opportunities in the region, so it is at the very beginning stage of widening the footprint of the bank,” Samaroo told the online publication Demerara Waves Online News.
He said the financial institution, though small, was holding “some investments regionally and globally” and was exploring options such as corporate lending.
Samaroo said that the 32-year-old financial institution would be searching for investment opportunities and had not reached the stage of planning a branch “as yet” in St. Lucia.
“We’re establishing a presence, and we’re managing some investments through that branch for the wider Caribbean, but St Lucia is the focal point; it’s where everything will be based,” he said.
The Group Chairman said St Lucia’s laws “allow for this operation.” Hence, the corporate decision-makers wanted to widen the bank base outside Guyana, “not to have it in one location but to start looking at the wider region.”
Known as DB St Lucia Incorporated, the investment subsidiary has already received regulatory approval from the St. Kitts-based Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB),” he said, adding, “It’s incorporated, and it’s holding some investments that the bank has.”
Samaroo said that unlike Guyana, St Lucia “created this kind of regulation that allows investment companies to be based there.
“We believe that Guyanese companies should not confine their thought process to Guyana but should look outside and the first step in the region to see how we can start positioning ourselves to go after opportunities in the region,” he said.
Demerara Bank was incorporated in January 1992 and declared open in 1994.
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