In the BCR deal, SIF shareholders go with the first option: the money

The shareholders of SIF "Muntenia" no longer look at the listing of BCR as anything other than a "plan B". They now mostly want "a different way of liquidizing" the company"s stake in BCR according to the decision made in General Shareholder Meeting held yesterday, which empowers the management of SIF4 to complete the ongoing negotiations with "Erste", which have as their objective to have the company receive shares in Erste Bank and cash in exchange for the shares it owns in BCR.

The shareholders have agreed that they would force the listing of BCR only if the negotiations weren"t completed by October 13.

Lawyer Cristian Duţescu says there were a number of irregularities at the General Shareholder Meeting of SIF4. He said that the proposals made by SAI Muntenia were put in the vote bulletins and in the proxy forms, but were not mentioned on the Notice to attend.

Cristian Duţescu said: "What happened today (ed. note: yesterday) at the General Shareholder Meeting of SIF4 can set a very bad precedent. The proposals of the Board of Directors of SIF4 were placed directly in the proxies and in the voting bulletins, but there was no notice to attend which mentioned them. Any additions to the notice to attend, must be mentioned in a revised agenda published ten days before the General Extraordinary Shareholder Meeting".

• One of the shareholders of SIF4: "They told me to go negotiate with Erste in their stead"

The General Shareholder Meeting of SIF4 began yesterday at around 10:00, however it took a while before the shareholders held the vote, as they addressed several questions to the management of SIF4 on the deal with "Erste".

Gabriel Iliescu, one of the shareholders of SIF4, expressed his discontent on the deal, claiming it was detrimental to SIF4, and therefore to its shareholders.

"I don"t understand why SIF4 accepted to sell 33 million shares of BCR at a price of 0.1 lei/share, even though it is selling 51 million shares of BCR at a price of 1.035 lei", the aforementioned shareholder said, and he added: "The managers of the SIF said that overall, there was no better deal, and blamed the current economic circumstances and the state of the markets. They told me to go and negotiate with Erste in their stead".

However the officials of the SIF rejected the accusations of the disgruntled shareholder.

"If anybody thinks that we went to Vienna just to have coffee rather than fight for getting the best terms that we could, they are mistaken", an official of SIF4 said.

Yesterday"s General Extraordinary Shareholder Meeting was attended by shareholders owning 11% of the total number of issued shares.