Mr. Vassil Christov begins his work in Fibank in 2001 as a head of division "Mortgage loans". From 2002 he was a director of "Retail banking" department, and from 2005 to 2010 he was a director of "Branch network department". In 2010 Mr. Christov has been elected as a member of the Managing Board of Fibank, and in beginning of 2011 he has been appointed as a deputy executive director.

Before joining Fibank, Mr. Christov had worked as a senior credit officer of "Large corporate customers" at United Bulgarian Bank AD. He holds a Master’s degree in accounting and control from the University of National and World Economy in Sofia.

Besides his position in the Bank, Mr. Christov is also a member of the Board of Directors of First Investment Bank - Albania. Mr. Christov is a member of the Managing Board of the "National Real Estate Association".

From the perspective of demand on the market could you specify what the tendencies in retail banking are?

Before I respond to this question I would like to clarify something - retail banking is wrongly translated into Bulgarian. Essentially, in most of the cases it is a collective definition of banking products and services for physical persons, which can be any type – credit, deposit, payment etc.

Nowadays and a hundred years ago irrespective of the financial and economic crisis, the demand for services and bank products is defined by several main factors: security and reliability of the bank, confidentiality of relationships, mutual trust, speed and quality of service and of course the opportunity to receive assistance from the bank when you most need it.

By answering the question about tendencies from the point of view of demand of products and services from physical persons, I will emphasise on the increase of number of our clients and to our joy I can share with you that our Clients are becoming more demanding, exigent and competent. This, of course gives us the motivation to develop and meet their expectations. As I previously mentioned in other interviews, the future of this segment is one and it is called FIRST - CLASS CLIENT SERVICE and everything else is a question of technical details and time.

What factors will influence the segment (retail banking) in the next 1 to 3 years?

The main impetus for the development of the segment - banking services and products for physical persons - in the next up to three years will be the expected growth of the world and Bulgarian economy and from there the perspective of increasing the wealth of the Bulgarians, our clients.

This is the most sensitive banking segment, the client’s behaviour is a mirror of the economy and everything that takes place in it both as real measurements and expectations. Naturally there would be significant influence of competition on the banking market.

The factors at issue are the price of real estate, unemployment, currency stability and many more micro and macro economic indicators. In respect of the competition in the sector the technical security of banks and investments in new technologies are of significant importance.  Our clients get used to high - tech and innovative products, which ensure comfort and security.

What is your strategy for growth of the segment in the next years?

I can answer only in one way to this question - our strategy is for growth. Fibank in this respect is a factor with which all participants in the sector comply with. During the years we have shown that many tendencies come from us, big part of the innovative products on the market are created and imposed by the Bank. We have many times won the prize of Client’s Bank. In 2010 Fibank has been with the biggest growth of funds belonging to physical persons and household of 33 % at 12,9 % for the whole banking system and thus we rise to the second position in this list and this fact to every bank means trust and stability. In the last year we launched several unique products on the Bulgarian market – credit and debit cards with the possibility of no-contact payments, programme of loyalty YES, system for additional identification of Clients with chip technology and as you know Fibank was the first to introduce the chip technology to debit and credit cards, we also were the first to launch debit cards with international access, we were the first to launch the mortgage overdraft (flexible mortgage), and in some of these products we continue to be unrivalled as of this moment. All these facts illustrate our attitude to this segment and prove that our vision of its development is aggressive.

Do you plan development of e-banking and providing more "distance" services?

We have not suspended our investment in the area of e-banking and all based on it services. This channel of service gains more and more popularity among bank service users. This is so because it offers speed, comfort, security - all these things that are really appreciated in the modern lifestyle.

Fibank was the first to launch the electronic platform for banking in 90's of the previous century and today we have one of the most developed virtual banking branches for which we already launched a mobile version. This month we will launch on the market an innovative form of telephone banking. Fibank invested a lot in technologies guaranteeing the improvement of electronic security and an example that I can give you are the token devices, e-certificates and e-signatures. We plan to open the first in Bulgaria office without bank employees.

What are the basic problems standing before crediting the SMEs?

If we can talk about problems at all then they are systematic and related to the business environment where these SMEs operate. In the years of rapid growth of economy many companies from this segment had bigger expectations of market development and as a result of this they incapacitated their strong positions in the form of making investments, developing products in new markets, investing in new technologies, new machinery and buildings. At present all these investments do not bring the expected return which lowers the level of liquidity of companies. A challenge to the SMEs is the regular complying with their obligations and it is a challenge for the banks to put themselves in the shoes of their clients and offer them different forms of restructuring their debts.

It is a policy of First Investment Bank to create and take care of its Clients and understand them when they experience problems.

What are the different options you present to the SMEs so that they pay back their credits? Do you develop new mechanisms with which you plan to ease the options for crediting from this persepctive?

Fibank uses and accepts as securities under the credits all acknowledged and acceptable in accordance with the normative documents securities. It is an essential rule in crediting that the business in financed and not the security. We grant opportunity to the business to develop and realize its ideas at an acceptable for the bank risk. Therefore Fibank has a very highly developed analytical branch in its credit departments and assesses the options of every project to generate profit and pay back the credit, the security must not be leading but a collateral guarantee.

In addition, I can say that apart from conventional securities we offer to our clients possibilities for providing security under the lines of the National Guarantee Fund, the Municipality Guarantee Fund and Bulgarian Agency for Export Insurance.