Awgaro Bank, officially the only private bank in Eritrea, has been told to close down. The bank, which was �under establishment� for the last three years, has issued notices �inviting shareholders to visit its headquarters in Liberation Avenue in Asmara for important information�. The �important information�, which the Bank�s notice did not disclose, was to inform shareholders of the Government�s decision to dissolve the Bank.

The founding members of the bank are Dr. Abraham Medhane, Mr. Yohannes Zekarias, Mr. Tesfai Gebre and Mr. Tesfamariam Negash. 

Awgaro Bank was touted as a financial institution in December 2001. With initial capitalization of 100 million Nakfa, the bank�s initial public offering was 50,000 outstanding shares with par value of 100 USD (then 1,000 Nkf).  The minimum number of shares for acquisition was 50 and the cap was 2,500 shares per individual.  Its services were to include currency exchange and insurance. At the time of its launching the government had pointed to it as a model of its efforts to strengthen the private sector and its founding members visited the Diaspora to raise funds.