A year and a half ago from an interview on the show “120 minutes” it became public knowledge that The Bulgarian Development Bank – the state bank, whose main task is to support small and medium-sized businesses with loans, has granted loans in huge amounts to certain companies.
It turned out that only 8 of these companies received nearly BGN 1 billion from the state money. One of the companies had received a loan of BGN 150 million, most of which it became clear that the bank would not get back.
“This credit is not granted to be paid back. The company was taken over by us. We have appointed a manager. Involuntarily, we deal with road maintenance”.
That said before bTVquoted by novini.bg the executive director of the Bulgarian Development Bank Tsanko Arabadzhiev. The company is associated with Rumen Gaitanski-Valka.
“The prosecutor’s office closed the proceedings. We appealed to the higher prosecutor’s office, but they also canceled it. We have written a letter to the Attorney General, we have no information on what the decision will be. We are waiting for a reaction from Borislav Sarafov,” explained Arabadzhiev.
“Our task and mission is not to give the cheapest interest rates. We finance projects and businesses that have a problem accessing finance. If he has the opportunity to be financed by any commercial bank, that is what he should do. We finance businesses and projects that are struggling. It’s a risky game. We take more risk, but that’s how we fulfill our promotional role,” he added.
“The interest in our loans is increasing. Our transformation is successful. The bank has approved loans for over BGN 130 million. There is a market for our products. Small and medium-sized enterprises do not have access to financing, contrary to attitudes, and we are trying to fill this segment,” stressed Arabadzhiev.
“Our task, in addition to the transformation, was to stabilize the bank financially. In 2020 and 2021, the bank’s losses amounted to BGN 400 million. That’s a colossal amount. The bank has been profitable for the past two years. We will end 2023 with 30 million. The cost-to-profit ratio is one of the best in the banking system,” he added.
“During one monitoring, we noticed that there is a commercial bank that granted loans under the covid program, which has significantly worse portfolio parameters. 35% of the granted loans are more than 90 days overdue. The remaining banks are between 1 and 3%. BGN 100 million is the portfolio,” said the director of the Bulgarian Development Bank.
“35% of this BGN 100 million is overdue for more than 90 days. We did an investigation and found an organized system of abuse of the program. Firms were acquired shortly before they responded to the covid program. They are given credit. The money is not used for its intended purpose. Instead of covering expenses such as wages and paying suppliers, a third party invoices for a non-specific activity – grain delivery, for example. You pay and the money goes to the third company. Often, the debtor company is sold to low-income individuals,” explained Arabadzhiev.
“We have reason to believe that there is a bad practice. We won’t pay the bail. This is definitely to me a matter of employees who are not in good faith. It passed through two branches of the bank in Sofia and through three employees in them. The group is small. We detected it in time and not a single lev from the guarantee will be paid,” he emphasized.
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2023-12-17 19:29:00
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