Mulls building a 100 room hotel at Roxy Cinema:

ETI to open in Myanmar

Shirajiv SIRIMANE

ETI Finance Limited will open their first overseas branch in Myanmar soon. Jeevaka Edirisinghe, Chairman of Swarnamahal Financial Services, told ‘Daily News Business’ at the launch of ‘Ran Wasi’ savings account which offers gold sovereign coins to customers opening fixed deposits said that they were looking at the financing sector in Myanmar.

First Lady Shiranthi Rajapaksa accepting a deposit from a customer on behalf of ETI. ETI Group Chairperson, Dr. Soma Edirisinghe looks on. Pictures by Saliya Rupasinghe

He said that the Myanmar economy is now opening up and there are opportunities for the financial sector. “We are hoping to concentrate on leasing and also in the micro-fiance sector as entrepreneurs would be looking at borrowings in a big way,” he said.

He said that they will look at a partner in Myanmar in this regard. The ETI which is now aggressively moving ahead in the leisure sector is also planning to build a 100 room hotel at the Roxy Cinema premises in Wellawata, similar to their refurbished Concord Grand Hotel Dehiwela.

The group also is in the process of refurbishing Sapphire Hotel in Colombo 6. The Group also operates bungalows in Kaduwela and Nuwara Eliya.

Senior Minister for International Monetary Co-operation and Deputy Minister of Finance and Planning Dr. Sarath Amunugama who was a special invitee at the launch said that the Sri Lanka savings habit which was among the best in Asia has now fallen to a very low ebb and the banks must promote the savings habit once again.

“Savings contribute to economic growth of the country and leads to more lending for entrepreneurs,” he said.

He also commended the ETI group for launching a product of this nature which would help to promote savings.