UPDATE: PRESS: Otkritie FC Bank can launch unit for troubled assets 2018

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MOSCOW, Dec 25 (PRIME) -- Otkritie Financial Corporation (FC) Bank can create a separate entity for troubled and non-core assets in 2018, Mikhail Zadornov, appointed as the bank’s CEO from 2018, told business daily Kommersant in an interview published on Monday.

“We will gather the troubled and non-core assets which are on the balance of Otkritie, Bank Trust, pension funds and Rosgosstrakh, in a separate structure. It could be a newly created fund or perhaps a ‘bad bank’ which could be formed on the basis of Bank Trust,” Zadornov said.

He also said that a merger of the three banks undergoing bailouts – Otkritie FC Corporation, B&N Bank and Promsvyazbank – is being discussed. “This option is being discussed but it is not the only one.”

The central bank said in August it would bail out troubled Otkritie FC Bank and become its investor using funds of the Banking Sector Consolidation Fund, a newly created mechanism.

Earlier in December, the central bank approved a revised bailout plan for Otkritie FC Bank that encompasses injection of 456.2 billion rubles into the bank’s capital, including 42.2 billion rubles to be provided as financial aid to Rosgosstrakh.

(58.3152 rubles – U.S. $1)

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