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8.1.4 Bank news
Ukraine's state-owned PrivatBank, nationalised in late 2016, estimates its losses due to the annexation of Crimea by Russia in 2014 at more than $9bn, according to the bank's deputy board chairperson Halyna Pakhachuk. She told the NV.Business outlet that the lawsuit was filed in the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague regarding assets in Crimea for the amount of over $1bn. "But, if you assess the losses as a whole, I think that the bank lost more than $9bn. This is the currency position, these are loans," Pakhachuk said. In February, PrivatBank secured a partial award in its favour in the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague, where the lender is challenging Russia's expropriation of the bank's investments in Ukraine's Crimea. Specifically, the arbitral tribunal found that it has jurisdiction over all of PrivatBank’s claims against Russia, that Moscow breached its obligations under the Ukraine-Russia bi-lateral investment treaty by unlawfully expropriating PrivatBank’s investments in Crimea, and that PrivatBank is entitled to full compensation for that expropriation, the bank said in a statement e-mailed to bne IntelliNews on February 15. The arbitral tribunal reserved for the next phase of the arbitration the question of how much compensation is due to PrivatBank for Russia's "unlawful actions". PrivatBank seeks compensation in excess of $1bn. In 2018, the International Court of Arbitration in Paris has ruled that the Russian government should pay compensation of $1.3bn for losses caused by the illegal military annexation of Crimea in 2014 to Ukraine’s second biggest lender Oschadbank. Oschadbank filed a lawsuit in August 2016 with claims for the recovery of lost assets and remuneration for the lost of business and payable interest caused by Russia’s take over of the peninsula. Russia refuses to recognise the ruling, as it believes the court had no authority to consider Oschadbank’s claim against Russia. The move followed another Oschadbank lawsuit worth UAH15bn ($589mn) filed in 2015. Earlier, the Ukrainian leadership urged all Ukrainian state-owned companies to follow the example of Oschadbank and recover damages for the annexation of Crimea and the loss of Ukrainian property.
Ukraine's PrivatBank, nationalised in late 2016, has reportedly accused its former owners, oligarchs Ihor Kolomoisky and Gennadiy Bogolyubov, of allegedly laundering $622.8mn, which were issued as loans to one companies of the beneficiaries for the same purpose, but then were used by other companies to purchase assets for them in the US. In May, PrivatBank instituted legal proceedings against its former owners as well as "other individuals and companies", before the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware. By this complaint, the bank is seeking "redress in respect of losses amounting to hundreds of millions of US dollars, which PrivatBank asserts it has suffered as a result of various unlawful acts perpetrated against it by its former owners, their close associates Mordechai Korf, Chaim Schochet and Uriel Laber, and various US-registered companies in which those individuals are and have been involved", the bank's statement reads. The statement appeared against a background of a snowballing legal crisis over the PrivatBank nationalisation between the NBU, the Ukrainian government and ex-owner oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky. On April 18, the Kyiv Administrative Court backed Kolomoisky's lawsuit, ruling that PrivatBank's nationalisation was unlawful. According to PrivatBank's lawsuit filed to the Delaware court, promulgated by analyst of Atlantic Council Anders Aslund, accuses the former owners of the bank, Ihor Kolomoisky and Hennadiy Boholiubov, in allegedly laundering $622.8mn, which were issued as loans to one of the companies of the beneficiaries for the same purpose, but then were used by other companies to purchase assets for them in the US, Interfax reported last week.
55 UKRAINE Country Report July 2019 www.intellinews.com