Syria mulls liberalising banking sector

The Syrian central bank governor said Tuesday that he intends to allow foreign banks to take majority stakes in local lenders.

"We need to remove obstacles to the banking sector to open up to international banks," Adib Mayaleh told Dow Jones Newswires in an interview.

Currently, foreign banks are allowed to own only up to 49% of a Syrian bank.

"We want to open foreign ownership in Syria's banks to 60%," Mayaleh said on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund/World Bank annual meetings.END