Laiki buys Nicosia HSBC ops

The Cyprus Popular Bank Public Company Ltd (Laiki Bank) announced that it has entered into an agreement to purchase certain of the assets and liabilities of the Nicosia Branch of HSBC Bank Plc.

These assets and liabilities are customer loans of CYP 20 mln and related guarantees and customer deposits of CYP 77 mln. The assets and liabilities will be transferred to Laiki at their face value and there will be no payment of goodwill.

The purchase is subject to the approval of the Central Bank of Cyprus.

In addition, Laiki will offer employment to the majority of the HSBC branch staff numbering around 12, which basically is seen as the cost of Laiki acquiring the customer deposits and loans of HSBC in Cyprus.

The move follows the earlier exit of HSBC from the share capital of Laiki Bank, which was sold to Marfin, the Tosca Fund and Laiki staff, and officially heralds the departure of HSBC from the government controlled part of Cyprus.

HSBC continues to maintain branches that it was left with in the occupied areas when it acquired Turkey’s Demir Bank, and has shown no rush to dispose of its presence from the Turkish occupied territories.