Ukraine natl bank wants to ban cap withdrawal by Russian banks’ units

KIEV, Mar 15 (PRIME) -- The National Bank of Ukraine has offered to bar affiliates of Russian state banks from taking capital out of the country, First Deputy Chairman Yakov Smoliy said on Wednesday.

“The application of such sanctions will mean a prohibition on fulfillment of any financial operations to the benefit of parent banks… and also is a prohibition to pay dividends, interests and to repay interbank loans, correspondent account money and subordinated debt,” Smoliy said.

Sberbank started accepting passports issued by self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk republics on March 7. Kiev said it disagreed with this. The National Security and Defense Council ordered the national bank and the security service on Wednesday to figure out sanctions against Russian state-banks within a day.

Deputy Chairwoman of the national bank Yekaterina Rozhkova said during a briefing broadcast by channel112 Ukraine that she hopes that units of Russian state banks will leave the market in a civilized way.

“We hope that the potential departure of these banks from the market will be made in a civilized way, either by sale, or by a gradual fulfillment of the liabilities to the clients,” she said.

Rozhkova said that the authority has no objections concerning the fulfillment of its regulations by affiliates of Russian state banks.

Liabilities of the affiliates to clients amount to U.S. $1.4 billion and their loan portfolios total about $5.6 billion.

Sberbank said late on Monday that its headquarters in Kiev were blocked with concrete bricks by Ukrainian nationalists. The bank also saw 26 vandalism acts against its offices and ATMs. Private Alfa-Bank later also reported violent acts against its property.

Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of Russia’s State Duma, the parliament’s lower house, ordered the profile committees to prepare applications to parliaments of the E.U. states, the European Parliament, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and the Council of Europe with a petition to evaluate the Ukrainian events.

Russian state banks have five affiliates in Ukraine: Sberbank and VTB Ukraine, BM Bank, a unit of the Bank of Moscow, Prominvestbank, unit of Vnesheconombank, and VS Bank of Sberbank. According to Smoliy, sanctions are considered against these banks.

There are eight Russian banks affiliates in Ukraine at large, the private ones are Alfa-Bank, Ukrsotsbank of Alfa-Bank and Bank Forward of the Russian Standard Bank.

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