Deepened wounds, effects of the intervention of BPA, II

The Government of Andorra is ready to give the final blow of its criminal plan, to finalize the sale of the new financial institution called VallBanc, the “legitimate” business of the Banca Privada d’Andorra (BPA), at a public auction that has just entered its final phase.

Meanwhile Antoni Martí announced that his government is prepared to unblock the accounts of the thousands of clients cleared of suspicions of Banca Privada d’Andorra (BPA) that were affected by the entity a year ago, and at the same time preparing to open the financial market of the Principality to new international banks.

United States reported in March 2015 that BPA offered services of money laundering for international organized crime groups, which led to the Andorran authorities taking control of the entity, however 12 months later, BPA came out clean – for which the United States had to withdraw the fearsome alert -, and thousands of accounts were still not unfrozen.

At the same time the State Agency for Resolution of Banking Institutions (AREB), the agency that Andorra created for the banking bailout, has just received two offers for VallBanc from international firms in both cases. Namely, the U.S. investment fund J.C. Flowers and the British Socrates Capital.

The plan of the Andorran Government is now to open the Andorran financial market – until now dominated by a mob of local bankers – to international firms to help reinforce the confidence of investors, clients and authorities, which was all lost in just a few months to the detriment of the Principality.

AREB is analysing the two proposals received by the investment funds and is meant to award the entity in the next few days. The winner will predictably be announced before the end of this month.

The premise with which AREB works is “to select the winning bid that involves the most efficient use of public resources and is most suitable for the interests of future clients and employees of VallBanc” as stated by the agency itself in its latest press release.

AREB’s weak anti-money laundering controls and the high level of corruption in the management of the Banca Privada d’Andorra (BPA) clearly caused the illegal intervention. Today maintained by the thieves in ‘suit and tie’, Alexandre Saura and Fernando Vázquez de Lapuerta.

Jordi Cinca, Minister of Finance of Andorra, is lying when he says, “after a few months of a lot of tension, we had the ability to manage and return the calmness”, because there are still thousands of clients that have not been able to recover their savings and are being denied any information in regards to them.