The weakness of Russia’s financial sector and its inability to mobilize and allocate resources efficiently are major constraints on Russia’s ability to sustain macro-economic growth over the long term. This, combined with the lack of access to international debt markets and the limited availability of long term funding, are major impediments to its overall economic growth. As a result, Russian private sector companies and exporters are prevented from making much needed capital investments as well as obtaining import and export financing for their products. Following the recent upturn in Russia’s economy, Russian companies are seeing emerging opportunities recorded in the increased level of trade between Western countries and Russia. The proposed project will help BCEN-EuroBank (or the bank) to provide critically lacking term resources and trade lines to private Russian corporations. In addition, by providing term resources at time when the bank is going through a transition from state to private ownership, IFC will lend credibility to BCEN-EuroBank and enhance its privatization prospects. It is expected that ultimately, the success of the privatization will free up resources from the public sector and lay the groundwork for creating a sustainable private sector bank.