Babacan attends Financial Times Turkey seminar

Deputy Prime Minister Ali Babacan noted that they did not rush in first public offering of the Ziraat Bank but, he added, they would hire consultants to start the evaluation process in Ziraat Bank. Babacan answered the questions from journalists at The Financial Times Turkey Seminar in Istanbul yesterday. Answering a question about the second public offer of Halkbank, Babacan said, "There are two topics on our agenda. One of them is the second public offer of Vakifbank and the first public offer of the Ziraat Bank. But we are not going to rush about such issues." In response to another question, Babacan said that the revenue from the privatization of Halkbank was kept in Turkish Privatization Administration and it would be added as an income to the next year's Budget. Babacan also stated that within the context of policies aimed at increasing savings they had already completed the studies to extend the maturity of deposits in banks. As part of this, lower reserve requirement and lower withholding tax is expected for long term deposits. Touching on reserve requirements, Babacan said that they had already worked on the subject at the financial stability committee and they were just going to initiate the application process.