The ceremony, held in Shanghai where the NDB’s headquarters are located, was relatively low-key in comparison to a June signing of the articles of agreement for the AIIB in Beijing, which was attended by delegates from 57 countries and President Xi Jinping.
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The bank is to start out with a capital of $50bn (£32bn) though the amount is to be doubled in the coming years.
The first president of the bank will be Kundapur Vaman Kamath, who previously worked as chairman of Indian IT services company, Infosys Limited, and as non-executive chairman of India’s private bank ICICI Bank. China pitched in 41 percent, with 18 percent from Brazil, India, and Russian Federation, and 5 percent from South Africa.
Operations would begin late this year or early in 2016, he added.
Lou Jiwei said the New Development Bank was an alternative to the existing global financial system and it would seek innovation on governance.
At the time, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that the five countries “illustrate a new polycentric system of worldwide relations”.
“NDB’s support for infrastructure construction will effectively ease the bottleneck that has constrained emerging and developing nations for long and will offer support for their economies’ upgrade and growth”, he said.
The regionally-focused Asian Development Bank also said it would “look forward” to working with the NDB.
The NDB is also backed by the China-floated United States dollars 50 billion Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in which India and 56 other countries have joined.
The bank was conceived as a counterbalance to Western-led financial institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund by providing funding for infrastructure and development projects in BRICS countries.
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A Chinese analyst denied the BRICS bank was aimed at challenging other multilateral agencies.
