December 06, 2017, 00:24 / Finance

Otkritie Holding is looking for new assets to replace the lost bank FC Otkritie

The company bought almost 10% in the Qiwi payment system and increased the share to 22% Alexandra Astapenko Anna Eremina

Otkritie Holding is looking for new assets to replace the lost bank FC Otkritie / Dmitry Novozhilov / Vedomosti

The Otkritie Holding structure bought 9.77% of class B shares of the Qiwi payment system. Now the share of Otkritie Investments Cyprus Limited (OICL) has increased to 21.73%, or 4.9% of the votes, according to the company’s announcement. The transactions took place on November 30 and December 1 and cost OICL 4.1 billion rubles.

The price of Qiwi shares on NASDAQ fell on the days when the Otkritie structure bought securities. By the close of trading on November 30, the security fell in price by 5.6% to $14.73, on December 1 – by 3.4% to $14.23.

The main shareholder of Qiwi is its CEO Sergei Solonin, he owns 76.5% of class A shares, or 59.43% of the votes. Solonin did not respond to calls and messages from Vedomosti on December 5. “These are market transactions on the stock exchange, we do not know who sold the Qiwi shares. I did not sell my shares,” said Boris Kim, chairman of the board of directors of the payment system. A Qiwi representative assured that he is not aware of whether the main shareholder plans to reduce or increase its stake. The former subsidiary of Otkritie Holding, FC Otkritie Bank, also did not sell securities, its representative said. The representative of Otkritie Holding did not answer the questions, and the representative of the owner of FC Otkritie, Central Bank, did the same.

Shortly before the reorganization, FC Otkritie increased its stake in Qiwi

Finance / Banking

Even before the main asset of Otkritie Holding, the bank FC Otkritie, went for reorganization, the group tried to increase its stake in Qiwi. At the beginning of June, Otkritie Holding and OICL put out an offer to purchase 55% of class B shares in the payment system and even offered a premium of 19% to the market price of the shares (the companies were willing to pay $28 per share). The paper holders were ready to sell only a little more than half of what Otkritie Holding was counting on, and the offer did not go through.

Before the loss of the holding’s main asset, his desire to buy Qiwi shares seemed logical, since a large share could guarantee Otkritie a place on the board of directors of the payment system, says VTB Capital analyst Vladimir Bespalov. But now the situation looks less clear: part of the Qiwi shares has already been transferred to Otkritie FC and now, in order to have a seat on the board of directors, you need to buy up all the free float shares. “Maybe Otkritie Holding is buying up Qiwi shares for investment purposes or sees potential for cooperation,” he reflects.

On October 5, Solonin said that negotiations were underway to increase the share of the bank being rehabilitated in the Qiwi group.

Qiwi bought the technologies and brands of Rocketbank and Tochka

Finance / Professional participants

Otkritie FC bought Qiwi shares shortly before the reorganization - on August 1 and 2, and then again on August 25 and 29, now the bank has 23.9% of class B shares. Moreover, the bank bought the last two blocks from Otkritie Holding itself for 5. 3 billion rubles The transactions became known only in October, and a bank representative then said that the interim administration was studying these transactions and finding out how their terms corresponded to the interests of the bank.

The heads of the Central Bank have repeatedly stated that they are working with the former owners of two banks being rehabilitated - FC Otkritie and B&N Bank - to return assets. The regulator was able to return 46 billion rubles to Otkritie FC, Deputy Chairman of the Central Bank Vasily Pozdyshev said in an interview with Bloomberg. At the same time, assets worth another 79 billion rubles will have to be returned, including shares of Qiwi Bank, VTB , Polymetal International, as well as the Vivaldi Plaza business center, Pozdyshev was quoted by TASS.