Opportunities abound, Guyanese “must seize the moment” – New Hayven founder

Thirty years after the first merchant bank was licensed in Guyana, the New Hayven Merchant Bank on Thursday opened its doors to assist investors and small businesses in the country’s growing development.

Founder of New Hayven, Floyd Haynes underscored that in the presence of opportunities and growing demands for investment, the ability to finance ventures is missing from the equation. It is a gap which the bank will be addressing.

“It is that gap that we sought to fill. That was the impetus for starting New Hayven…It is obvious that there is huge capital gap or money gap. In other words, there simply isn’t enough money to finance the transformation and development of this country in country. So, some of those monies will come from multilaterals, friendly governments but it’ll be a loan. But a large part of that has to be private capital and that’s where we see New Hayven playing a crucial role,” Haynes underlined.
The founder added that the strides to establish this merchant bank was years in the making but comes at a time when it is greatly needed.
“This isn’t something that was handed down overnight. It was hard work…There is a tide in the affairs of nation and Guyana’s tide is at its flood. We, as Guyanese, must seize the moment. There has never been a time in the history of Guyana when there were more opportunities for Guyanese and Guyanese-based businesses. Opportunities abound.”
Chief Executive Officer Kurt Kisto said the new institution will connect investments with the rapid growth to be witnessed in the near future.
“Our mission is to create value for our clients by providing investment services to innovative solutions utilising and understanding the global strategy to connect with the local opportunities and ensure all our dealings are grounded in honesty, integrity and fairness in conducting business with all our stakeholders,” the CEO told stakeholders.

Economic success
President Dr Irfaan Ali in delivering his feature address underscored Government’s vision for shared prosperity and ideas to drive the country towards greater economic success.
The Head of State expressed, “Sometimes we look for transformation in a road and building because that is physical but there are a number of things that must occur behind the scenes that you can’t see physically that are equally important in the transformation process.”
He added, “The development of Guyana must be built on a foundation that delivers equal opportunities for everyone. But those opportunities must not only be spoken and that is why this investment is so critical.”
According to Ali, he will not support any “sideshow” events that have little bearing on the country’s development, but rather invest in areas to enhance Guyana in all sectors.
“The road to sustainable and resilient development and a future that we can all look forward to requires diversification. It requires us to understand that the economy must stand on many different platforms. It requires us to understand what defines the diversification that we’re talking about. If you try to understand diversification as financial diversification, you will fail. When we’re talking about national development it has to be an economic diversification that incorporate social components.” (G12)