OREANDA-NEWS. May 19, 2010. Marina Kazaeva placed among the top 3 finalists receiving Financier of the Year awards at the Orenburg City Administration “Person of the Year” prize-giving ceremony, reported the press-centre of Uniastrum.

Award ceremony held to honor the winners of the annual Person of the Year competition in the Financier of the Year category. Uniastrum’s Marina Kazaeva was among the prizewinners, having succeeded in meeting the exacting standards imposed by the judges and fend off stiff competition. This year’s Financier of the Year hopefuls were assessed and ranked on the basis of their professional knowledge, their initiative, hands-on participation, and financial results. The ultimate aim of the competition is to promote Orenburg’s achievements in the social and economic sphere, as well as to underline the increasingly high quality of the city’s financial community.

Marina Kazaeva has headed Uniastrum Bank’s Orenburg branch since it began operating in 2005. Last year, the Orenburg office was Uniastrum’s third most successful branch, issuing more than Rb 543 mn under corporate lending programs. Moreover, over the same period its corporate credit portfolio expanded 5-fold to tip the scales at a healthy Rb 486 mn, while the branch’s small business portfolio grew 2.3-fold.

Uniastrum’s Orenburg arm offers retail and business clients a broad array of banking services, including, among others, cash management services, forex transactions, promissory note operations, money transfers via the Unistream system, acquiring, international payments, issue and administration of payment cards, including corporate and payroll cards, deposit services, as well as lending to households and legal entities.

“It’s nice to think that in less than 5 years Uniastrum’s Orenburg branch has emerged as a major player and strong competitor on the local banking services market,” says Marina. “As of May 1, our total lending portfolio topped Rb 1 bn, which, needless to say, was a key milestone in our development.”