Deepened wounds, effects of the intervention of BPA

The BPA administration, still hiding behind the negligence in the proceedings of the Principality of Andorra, which has not wanted to recognize the damages caused by their intervention of BPA, and the brutal theft of 365 million euros from thousands of clients.

A year and a half since the illegal intervention of the Banca Privada d’Andorra (BPA), the tension is still present and the Andorran Government cannot breathe relieved. In the aftermath of the scandal and the patrimonial damages suffered by innocent people, there is a threat of a financial quarantine in effect, since the bank did not have the ability to manage and hand out a quick solution to the clients still struggling to recover their funds. Clients that are not giving up, and will go as far as necessary to receive compensation for the collateral damages suffered.

The BPA administration, still hiding behind the negligence in the proceedings of the Executive Board of the Principality specifically that of the Andorran National Institute of Finance (INAF), which has not recognized the damages caused by their intervention of the BPA, and the theft of 365 million euros from thousands of clients.

The struggle in courts by the swindled clients, brought together in a great platform, advised by recognized lawyer firms, is still standing and growing by the day. Like a ball of snow, they threaten to discredit and give the necessary tools to the International Rating Agencies to damage the image and the finance of the Government of Andorra further, currently battered by the national and international press.

The frustrated plan of the Andorran Government (headed by Antoni Martí), to bail out BPA, has caused the current software provider (the US-based IBM), that regulates banking transactions, deposits, transfers and withdrawals, to refuse to renew the license of the services it provides. This makes it even more difficult for the affected clients to retrieve their money in a short term.

Other software companies that offered additional services to BPA may follow behind IBM, which would collapse even further its operation and increase the complexity of the public management of the entity.

Now there are doubts about the solvency of the Principality, a situation that has led to the suspension of the financial operation of BPA, slowing down at the same time the transfer of its assets to the new VallBanc.

Added to this due to the inefficiency, omissions and bureaucracy of the Andorran executives, which promised a plan to resolve the problem, is that yet again new alerts have been turned on by the International Ratings Agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P), which since March of last year had lowered its rating of the bank with a very bad rating.

Also, the conclusions of the audit that PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) performed from the moment that the entity was intervened, which have not been released due to the discrepancies in the results that have emerged, have stained with manure the Government of Martí, who no longer sees how hard they hit him, but how many times.

The tradition was broken as soon as the protection of saving clients was undermined. Clients, with their accounts blocked from the start of the intervention, were faced with impotence when the ‘numbers’ that identified their savings in the bank (numbered accounts – the great attraction of the Andorran financial system), were changed with their first and last names by instructions of the judge in charge.

Finally, the restructuring plan designed by the Executive by means of the State Agency for Resolution of Banking Institutions (AREB), also went down the drain, as its implementation is full of traps and doubts.