Interested in purchasing HPB conducts due diligence on the operations of Adriatic Bank

Croatian Postal Bank (HPB) reported on Monday that it has signed a confidentiality agreement as it intends to conduct due diligence for the potential acquisition of the Šibenik-based Adriatic Bank.

Adriatic Bank was established in 1957, has 205 employees and 16 branches, serving 56 thousand citizens and 3,600 legal entities and entrepreneurs. As the bank could no longer meet regulatory requirements regarding capital adequacy, the DAB decided on October 9, 2015, to open a rehabilitation procedure. A public call for the purchase of a 100% stake in the bank was published on February 15 of this year, and the deadline for submitting binding offers expired in May.

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During the sale process of Adriatic Bank in rehabilitation, seven expressions of interest from potential buyers were received, five potential investors entered the due diligence process, and only one of them submitted a binding offer, which was rejected.

– After the public call and the conducted due diligence procedures by interested potential investors, the Agency received an exceptionally attractive financial offer (offered price and additional recapitalization) for the sale of shares of Adriatic Bank from one potential investor. However, as the commission was unable to unequivocally determine the identity of the potential investor or the origin of the offered funds in the further process, the Agency decided to reject the received offer, DAB reported at the time, adding that alternative solutions for the sale of Adriatic Bank are being worked on.

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In early March of this year, three former and current members of the Management Board of Adriatic Bank, Ivo Šinko, Mirko Goreta, and Marija Trlaja, were arrested, whom the Šibenik police suspect of abuse of trust in economic crime, as well as entrepreneur Nikola Žnidarić from Čakovec.

The Šibenik-Knin Police Department announced that the criminal investigation established that the suspects, as members of the management of Adriatic Bank, namely Šinko as the CEO, Trlaja as his deputy, and Goreta as a member of the management, at the instigation of Žnidarić as the responsible person of the Čakovec company, approved the payment of two non-purpose loans and one factoring to that company in the amount of approximately 35.3 million kuna.