MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia’s Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina said on Friday that the sale of bailed-out lender Otkritie Bank to Russia’s No. 2 bank VTB would go through before the end of the year.
“As for the sale of Otkritie, it is in the final stages,” Nabiullina told a news conference. “We confirm our intention to complete the transaction by the end of this year.
She declined to disclose the price until all negotiations have concluded.
Both VTB and Otkritie have been targeted by Western sanctions over Russia’s actions in Ukraine.
Earlier this month, VTB said it had temporarily suspended coupon payments on a number of subordinated bond issues, a move approved by the central bank.
“As far as the VTB and Otkritie deal is concerned, we have no doubt about the solvency of the buyer,” Nabiullina said.
The central bank bailed out Otkritie, once Russia’s largest private lender, in 2017 as part of a years-long campaign to clean up Russia’s banking sector.
Otkritie had previously been linked with a possible sale to Italy’s UniCredit or even a public stock market launch before sanctions torpedoed plans for anything more than a domestic transaction.
“We were going to sell it on the market, including at a possible IPO, but due to the change in the situation, that has become almost impossible,” Nabiullina said on Friday.
“We are a regulator and a supervisory authority, therefore owning a bank is not normal.”
(Reporting by Alexander Marrow and Olesya Astakhova; Writing by Jake Cordell; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
