Business news from Ukraine

Nationalized Sens Bank to join government loan programs

16 August , 2023  

The nationalized Sens Bank (Kyiv, formerly Alfa-Bank) plans to join government loan programs, Rostislav Dyuk, deputy chairman of the financial institution’s supervisory board, said at a press conference on Tuesday.

“Last year, the bank reduced its assets to comply with certain NBU restrictions. But we have a strong base of loyal customers and expect them to return. Plus, now, as a state-owned bank, Sens Bank will be able to provide its customers with access to government lending programs,” Dyuk said.

Olena Zubchenko, acting chairman of the board, added that the bank plans to become a partner of the 5-7-9 program.

“We would like to join the eHouse program as well. But as for the mortgage program, we see the bank’s team that used to do something else. We will analyze how to launch it (the housing lending program), the main thing is that we managed to retain specialists,” the bank’s CEO said.

Zubchenko also sees e-commerce, gaming and other digital areas of the economy as promising areas of development.

“We will evaluate how and on what terms we will join these areas of financial sector development. Since we represent the interests of both retail and corporate business, this will remain the focus of our development,” she said.

As reported, the Chairman of the Board of Sense Bank (Kyiv, formerly Alfa-Bank) Dmitry Kuzmin, who was appointed to this position three weeks ago during the nationalization of the bank, resigned by mutual consent for personal reasons. On August 14, the Supervisory Board accepted his resignation and appointed Kuzmin’s deputy, Olena Zubchenko, who worked at the Ministry of Finance before the bank’s nationalization, as acting chairman of the board.

During a press conference, Shevki Adzhuner, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Sens Bank, clarified that Zubchenko “will act as the head of the bank for no more than six months.” According to him, the head of the bank will be elected in a competition, as well as several other positions of the bank’s management board, including CFO and COO.

Sens Bank ranks 11th among 65 operating banks in Ukraine in terms of assets (about 3.4% of the banking system’s total assets of UAH 96.637 billion). It was nationalized in the twentieth of July under a specially adopted law as a systemically important bank with majority shareholders from Alfa Group, which was subject to sanctions.

In the second quarter of 2023, the bank opened two new branches, expanding its network to 140 units across the country.

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