Bahrain issues eight licenses to new banks: CBB

With Bahrain’s gross domestic product is likely to see a steady growth of 3% in 2011, the Kingdom has issued eight licenses to the new entities to start operations in Bahrain, according to a top official at the Central Bank of Bahrain.

In an interview posted by the Bahrain News Agency, the Central Bank of Bahrain Governor, Rasheed al-Maraj revealed the projections and denied rumours that international banks had left Bahrain during recent unrest in the country.

“The central bank has issued eight licences for new financial institutions since the beginning of the year and we deal with any request that meets the required conditions without delay,” al-Maraj said.

Al-Maraj also said in the interview he expects interest rates to remain stable and announced an 11.5% increase in the CBB’s gold and hard currency reserves to $4.5billion.

In other reports Bahrain’s GDP growth outlook revised in June for the second time in a row, to 2.7% from 3.4% following unrest in the months of February and March this year.

Bahrain is the only Gulf state projected to see a budget deficit in 2011 – unchanged from the previous forecast at 1.4% of GDP. Last month, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa approved a $16.44bn budget for the next two years.