“The litigation if BES will endure for many years” – Economic

"The litigation if BES will endure for many years" – Economic

Filipe Alves

filipe.alves@economico.pt

00:05

Miranda is advising investors who feel wronged by the collapse of the BES.

Miranda has a strong international presence. That ‘feedback received after the collapse of BES ? This is a topic in which they are working, advising aggrieved investors
RA: How would the famous general, obviously. As you can imagine, the international exposure that we have made this situation very quickly BES opened all sorts of claims, complaints, proceedings, inquiries and other requests, Portuguese and foreigners. This is an evolutionary process that involves most major offices in Lisbon. We have an advantage, which is that we do not work with BES in the past and so we are free from conflicts of interest.

What do the investors
RA: They are disgusted with everything, first with those who caused the problem but also with the authorities who had obligations, but avoid, prevent this kind of debacle . The Bank of Portugal (BoP), auditors, internal audit fees and the lawyers themselves. Therefore, it is not easy, especially for a foreign investor, to understand how in the space of 15 days we went from a situation of a solid and capitalized bank with endorsement of a sovereign country to a dying bank. How does this happen in 15 days? Above all, there was an increase in share capital by public subscription in the bank at the time of subscription, could no longer be considered a bank able to govern itself. So this issue will last for many years, even many years, in terms of litigation and the various actions that are underway and others initiated in the short term.

Situations like withdrawal of Tranquility to GES and its inclusion in the New Bank, as decided by the BOP, can be reversed in court?
RA: We know it was an emergency situation and in such cases it is necessary to sacrifice some legal normality. Nevertheless, as a lawyer, make me an impression that this sort of thing is done this way for a regulator that is not a legislative body, an end-of-week, very probably illegal and anti-constitutional decisions. All this done in the name of urgency. Eventually that moment, it was possible to resolve the matter, now, will not achieve unless we put aside the rule of law, this will necessarily result in the cancellation of a series of decisions with unforeseen consequences.

And the State may be liable, for example, if the court cancel the sale of Tranquility and compel the Bank to indemnify the New GES a value that may exceed the 50 million from the sale to Apollo ?
RA: Sure. But this is just one of the risks. There are many risks. I suppose that even in the sale of New Bank case, of course that these contingencies will weigh in the decision making process of foreign buyers.
FAC: For customers, one thing is legal feasibility. Another is how to retrieve the compensation

New Bank Contingencies pass to the buyer
RA:.? If the New Bank is sold as a bank and not with assets to be sold separately, the contingencies are transferred to those who buy. Purchase the bank and their circumstances. So I am particularly curious about how this situation will evolve. The essential element of this strategy is to sell the New Bank very quickly and very high value. That alone is what allows the other banks in the system contribute supportable values.