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The decisions delegitimise the grounds on which the regulator decided to nationalise the bank after it found that all its loans were made to related parties and the bank had in effect been emptied of almost $8bn worth of capital, the former governor of eth NBU Valaria Gontareva told bne IntelliNews in an exclusive interview, who called the courts “corrupt.”
The new management of Privatbank is appealing the decision. PrivatBank was nationalised after a bne IntelliNews cover story “Privat investigations” revealing the high level of related party loans caused such a scandal the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) took the bank over a month later in December 2016.
The decisions unsettled depositors at the bank, which is the largest in the country and almost half the population -- some 22mn people -- bank with Privatbank.
The reaction of depositors was to get "a bit nervous" Anna Samarina, PrivatBank's CFO, told bne IntelliNews in an exclusive interview. Customers withdrew UAH8bn ($303mn) from the bank on the news, or some 5% of total deposits, Samarina said.
"As of today, we managed to recover part of that, but we are not back to previous levels," she said adding that despite the outflow the bank is stable and confidence has been restored.
However, Kolomoisky has launched numerous legal cases against Privatbank in the hope of recovering some more money.
Kolomoisky said on May 27 that he is ready to sign an “amicable agreement” with the country's authorities in exchange of around 25% of shares in the bank. Separately, he has demanded that $2bn of capital he claims was in the bank at the time of its nationalisation should be returned to him.
At the end of May Privatbank’s new management went on the offensive and hit back with a case of its own, accusing Kolomoisky of illegally laundering hundreds of millions of dollars through shell companies in Delaware in the US. Privatbank brought a case against Kolomoisky and his partner who was a co- owned in the bank, Gennadiy Bogolyubov, as well as "other individuals and companies", before the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware, the bank said in a statement e-mailed to bne IntelliNews on May 23.
"Up to 10% of the bank's operating costs are now dedicated to legal costs," she told Reuters on the side lines of a Ukraine investment conference.
2.1 Russia’s Gazprom has denied Ukraine’s claims that there will be a shortage of gas in Europe this winter
Russia’s Gazprom has denied Ukraine’s claims that there will be a shortage of gas in Europe this winter if the Russian gas giant decides to stop using Ukraine to transit gas to its western customers.
In an exclusive interview with bne IntelliNews “GAS WARS: Ukraine faces a bleak winter as Russia prepares to cut it off” Ukraine’s national gas company general director Yuriy Vitrenko said that the company’s base case scenario is all deliveries of Russian gas, including the transit gas to Russia’s European
13 UKRAINE Country Report July 2019 www.intellinews.com