Marfin boss wants Black Rock to assess Cyprus banking

Andreas Vgenopoulos, the biggest shareholder in the second largest bank in Cyprus, wants the investment management company and the world’s leading asset manager, Black Rock Inc., to assess the banking sector on the island before investing any more of his own money into the troubled sector.
Vgenopoulos, speaking to reporters for nearly 90 minutes on Friday, said that he was “not willing to participate in the current recapitalisation efforts” of the Cyprus Popular Bank which has been bleeding profits over its extensive exposure to government bonds and private debt in Greece.
The bank needs to find more than 1 bln euros in fresh capital by a mid-year deadline, but a senior source in Popular Bank told Reuters last month that it wants to be considered eligible for cash that will be disbursed to Greek banks under that country's bailout programme.
Vgenopoulos suggested that Popular and the Central Bank of Cyprus were colluding in order to secure a state-sponsored bailout if the recapitalisation plan fails.
Controlling a near-28% stake in Popular through his own Marfin Investment Group and Dubai Financial, he seemed determined to push for an intervention by Black Rock that will give a clear picture of the investment portfolios and non-performing loans and help Cyprus banks regain their credibility.
“I am the biggest investor in Cyprus, having pumped 3.2 bln euros through the three-way merger (of Popular with Greece’s Marfin and Egnatia banks) in March 2011 and my investments have diminished significantly. I don’t see why some people are apposed to Black Rock assessing the Cyprus banking sector,” he said.
Vgenopoulos used half the time of the media briefing to attack former centralbanker Athanasios Orphanides, who, he said, was acting as if in concert with the main opposition party and who had failed from 2008 to accept a radical reform of the banking sector that would have allowed for greater investments and expansion overseas. As a result, Vgenopoulos said, the then Marfin Popular Bank, was obliged to invest in Greek sovereign debt.
“I thought we should have left Cyprus [as a base for Marfin Popular] at the time and I have regretted we didn’t,” he said.
Vgenopoulos said that resorting to the EFSF stability fund was “not realistic” , but believed that reviving an old proposal to merge the island’s two banks – Popular and the Bank of Cyprus – would generate synergies of some 2 bln euros over five years.
The latest central bank data showed that the two banks controlled just over 44% of all deposits and 40% of all loans on the island. Bank of Cyprus recently raised nearly 600 mln euros from a rights issue and convertible bonds and hopes to collect 400 mln more in order to secure a solvency cushion imposed by the European Banking Authority.