Raiffeisen Bank disputes the bankruptcy of Cuprom

Raiffeisen Bank, one of the seven banks that is supposed to recoup millions of Euros lent to Cuprom SA, has filed an appeal on Wednesday with the Court of Bucharest against the decision of the assembly of creditors to reject the new plan for the reorganization of the company.

According to some market sources, the representatives of the bank have disputed the decision of the General Shareholder Meeting, because as part of the body of creditors, the lender has also been include as an unsecured creditor, meaning that the amount of those claims would be lost if Cuprom goes bankrupt.

Many of the 84 institutions which are part of the body of creditors that have unsecured creditor claims, as well as those that have secured claims, are pinning their hopes on a positive decision of the bankruptcy judge, so that they can recoup part of their loans to Cuprom SA, some of the sources said.

Recently, the receiver BDO Consulting told us that it is trying to find a solution to avoid Cuprom going bankrupt, but in that case the odds of success are purely theoretical.

Between 2007 - 2008, seven banks have went out of their way to lend money under favorable terms to Cuprom, which borrowed approximately 80 million Euros (186,603,025 RON in 2007, 157,496,061 RON in 2008).

Regardless of the outcome of the attempts to avoid the bankruptcy, the banks will get back at most 6 million Euros of the total loans granted to the company.

Moreover, out of the seven creditor banks, four of them have secured loans to recoup (Bancpost, BCR, Raiffeisen and Unicredit), whereas the other banks, specifically Alpha Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland and Citibank, were included among the unsecured creditors, meaning that they would not get their loans back, as is stipulated in the most recent reorganization plan.

The meeting of creditors was held on August 26th, when it was decided that the reorganization plan would be rejected.

• The former employees of Cuprom Baia Mare are owed over 600,000 lei

The former employees of Cuprom Baia Mare have over 600,000 lei to receive. "These copper barons can not be disturbed or hindered in their dirty intention to destroy the plant of Baia Mare, as they have the support of the local authorities in power at that time", Ioan Coza, the leader of the Cuprom Free Union recently said.

• Debts to the state budget - paid in a proportion of 90.09%

The reorganization plan also stipulates the repayment of approximately 18,177,183 lei (of which 90.09% has been paid) to the Local Council of the 1st District, The General Department of Public Finances and the Public Service for Public Finance. According to the bankruptcy scenario, the three public institutions will only receive 16,466,010 RON from Cuprom.