The NBU is preparing amendments to the legislation that will allow Sens Bank (Alfa-Bank) to be nationalized — SMI
The National Bank of Ukraine is preparing amendments to the law allowing to nationalize Sens Bank (formerly Alfa-Bank), whose nominal owners are Russian oligarchs Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven. The corresponding order was given by the head of the NBU, Andrey Pyshny, EP reports with reference to its sources.
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“The NBU aims to convince the Hetmantsev committee and the parliament to adopt a law that will ensure seamless nationalization,” the NBU emphasized.
Simplified nationalization procedure
These changes will allow applying the simplified nationalization procedure of a systemically important bank not only to a bank that has lost its liquidity, but also to a bank that has an opaque ownership structure.
Sens Bank is experiencing problems with the business reputation of its nominal shareholders and the ownership structure:
- On March 2, 2022, the regulator deprived Mikhail Fridman (32.86% of shares) and Peter Aven (12.4%) of the rights to manage the bank based on their shares due to the “loss of impeccable business reputation”;
- On March 21, the same decision was made in relation to other shareholders — Herman Khan (20.96%) and Alexey Kuzmychev (16.32%);
- On March 15, the National Bank of Ukraine made another decision to revoke the rights of management over shares of Alfa Bank — against Andrey Kosogov.
Unlike the other shareholders, international sanctions were not applied against the latter. The National Bank made this decision due to the fact that Khan and Kuzmychev hastily transferred their shares in the bank to Kosogov without coordinating it with the regulator.
All Russian shareholders of Alfa-Bank, against whom the NBU took influence measures, transferred the rights to manage their shares to the Bulgarian economist Simeon Dyankov. As evidenced by the decision of the NBU, such a measure should be temporary.
Since the bank did nothing to eliminate the reason for the punishment, the NBU had to recognize it as problematic. If the situation with the shareholders is not resolved within 120 days of the problem, then the bank should be withdrawn from the market.
When it became obvious that these problems would not exist in Sens Bank, the National Bank thought about other ways of its nationalization.
As the interlocutor of the EP told the parliament, one of these ways is the introduction of changes in the law that will allow the bank to be nationalized through an opaque ownership structure.
If the state chooses this path, it will allow nationalization of the bank according to a simplified procedure, without waiting for April and another 120 days of problems. And also regardless of the liquidity situation.
Let’s remind
In January, the first deputy head of the National Bank, Ekaterina Rozhkova, said that the NBU does not yet see Sens Bank (Alfa Bank) founded for nationalization.
Source: Ministry of Finance
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