A Russian arbitration court dismissed a 7.1 billion Russian ruble lawsuit launched by a local company managing the assets of nonstate pension fund NPF Safmar against Otkritie Financial Corp. Bank over losses stemming from investments into Otkritie Holding JSC bonds, news agency Prime reported.
A similar decision was taken by the court with regard to a lawsuit of over 9.5 billion ruble launched against Otkritie Bank by another Russian pension fund, NPF Doverie, which merged with NPF Safmar in March.
Safmar and Doverie launched their 16.6 billion ruble court proceedings at the beginning of the year, wanting Otkritie Bank to compensate them for the loss of profit resulting from B&N Bank's failure to repurchase the Otkritie Holding bonds. B&N Bank merged in 2018 with Otkritie Bank, which now acts as its legal successor.
The pension funds acquired the Otkritie Holding bonds in 2015-2016 and asked B&N Bank to repurchase the bonds in September 2017, after Otkritie Bank, controlled by Otkritie Holding at the time, was ailed out by the Russian central bank. However, B&N Bank failed to repurchase the securities because it was also taken over by the central bank and placed into provisional administration, which rejected the buyback request.
As of Aug. 6, US$1 was equivalent to 65.26 Russian rubles.
