Initiated by the Privatisation Agency, Parex banka’s shareholders will assemble for an extraordinary meeting to elect the Council and an Audit Committee for the bank on 6 April 2010.

The current membership of the Council was approved on 29 January 2010 with Andžs Ūbelis as the chairman and following members: Kaspars Āboliņš, Juris Vaskāns, Michael J. Bourke and Laurence Philip Adams.

Mr Ūbelis is also the deputy state secretary of the Latvian Finance Ministry, and he has chaired the bank’s Council since 23 December 2008. Over the course of 10 years in the system of national governance, he has held a series of positions related to management of EU financing, as well as European integration.

Mr Āboliņš is governor of the State Treasury, while Mr Vaskāns was formerly on the board of the Privatisation Agency. Mr Bourke has served a long term as the president of the Rietumu Banka. He also has a wealth of experience with international financial institutions, including the Irish Central Bank, the IMF, and the NCB Group. Mr Adams represents the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. He has a 25-year history in the financial sector and has worked for foreign financial institutions such as ABN AMRO Bank and Citibank.

The previous extraordinary meeting of shareholders was held on 29 January to decide on the issue of bank’s debt securities.

Currently, the Latvian Privatisation Agency is the majority shareholder of Parex banka, holding 76.6% of the Bank’s shares, but 19.7% are owned by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. Minority shareholders hold the remaining shares.

About Parex banka:

Founded in 1992, Parex banka currently employs some 1 900 people at branches all over Latvia and offers universal banking services throughout the Baltic region, the CIS and other European nations such as Germany, Switzerland and Sweden. Parex Group companies operate across the banking, finance, leasing, asset management and life insurance sectors. Parex banka has signed up to the European Code of Conduct on housing loans.

For more information please contact:
Inga Saleniece
Corporate Communications Department
Telephone: +371 67778870 or +371 26564629
E-mail: pr@parex.lv