After more than two decades, the Central Bank of Guyana has issued a banking licence and it’s to the Guyanese-owned New Haven Inc. Merchant Bank which was launched last evening.
At the launch held at the Marriott Hotel, business professor, accountant, and financial analyst, Floyd Haynes, who leads the New Haven Inc team, told of his humble beginnings here in Guyana as he urged locals to persevere and take risks.
Haynes’ risk taking and confidence in the land of his birth was also lauded by President Irfaan Ali, who said it was just one example reaping the fruits of labour. “Floyd is willing to take risks and is Guyanese,” Ali said of the venture.
Ali also told of a local who started selling local juice in bags when housing areas were beginning to open up years ago. The man moved to owning a motor scooter and eventually expanded his business to plying his trade from a car he bought from profits. Today the man owns four taxi cabs and continues to thrive, according to Ali, because of his perseverance.
The merchant bank, to be located at 304 Church Street in Georgetown, will initially employ 12 persons and Haynes had told this newspaper that number will be ramped up if needed.
It was Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo, during an outreach in Region Two in March, who made the initial announcement of the new financial institution’s formation. Haynes, who is founder and president of Haynes Incorporated, a Washington-based accounting and management consulting firm that provides high-level financial and accounting support to clients such as the United States Department of State and the United States Agency for International Development, told this newspaper that he took the investment decision because he sees great opportunity here.
“I just felt there is an underserved community of business persons with a lot of potential; a lot of opportunity and good business plans and there is no way for them to go get funding because the retail banks don’t cater to that market. So there is this emerging business class in Guyana that has a unique set of needs unlike anything the market caters for. It is expanding and there are new opportunities for both us and them.” He pointed out that local retail banks, where most small businesses go to access financing for their ventures, offer only debt financing.
“They may have good ideas, good project plans, but they can’t walk in and ask for equity financing because retail banks don’t offer equity financing. These businesses may be at a state where they are looking for both debt and equity financing; you know, where they may be giving up some ownership for financing,” he explained.
“Alternative source of capital is where we would step in. For example, you may take an interest ownership in exchange for the capital and be bought out at a later date. Retail banks are not set up for that. I can create a formal institution to provide the services those people need”, he said.
Another service Haynes’ merchant bank will offer is management of private pension schemes. “I felt there is an opportunity to provide a different level of management for pension schemes and that type of thing. There are a lot of pension schemes which deserve to have alternative management. At the end of the day they can determine where they get the best deal and we want to be that best deal. It is essentially identifying a gap in the market and satisfying that need.”
Haynes is a certified public accountant, holds a MSc in Financial Economics from the University of Oxford, and a master’s degree in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. He is also a partner with local chartered accountant, Chaitram Ramdihal, of the Ramdihal and Haynes Chartered Accounting and Professional Services Firm. The firm is part of the RHVE consortium of local accounting and auditing firms which recently bid to audit Guyana’s cost oil.
