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IBM and Atlas depositors were paid €95 million

Atlas banka

Deposit Protection Fund has reimbursed a total of €95,41 million of guaranteed deposits to the depositors of Atlas and IBM Montenegro. Director of the Fund, Mr Predrag Marković, said that Atlas bank clients had got more than €75 million, whereas €20,20 million went to IBM clients.

Central Bank of Montenegro instigated bankruptcy proceedings against IBM on 4 January 2019 and against Atlas bank on 4 April. The reason is negative financial performance, solvency coefficient lower than ¼ of the prescribed level and bank’s liabilities which are greater than its property. Both banks are owned by Duško Knežević.

Fund director said that a great number of deposits in IBM and Atlas bank were lower than €1.

“These are obviously inactive accounts, opened a long time ago”, said Mr Marković.

He explained that European standards stipulate that deposits lower than the payout costs shall not be reimbursed.

“In compliance with the Law on Consumers’ Protection, we enlisted all those depositors on the list of depositors entitled to guaranteed deposits payout”, said Mr Marković.

Currently the Fund disposes of around €53 million. As Mr Marković says, that’s enough in case two small banks go bankrupt.

Liquidity and solvency indicators of other 13 banks on the Montenegrin market are stable.

After EU membership guaranteed deposit will be €100.000

New Law on Deposit Protection will change the deposit limit from €50.000 to €100.000.

“The Law is currently under assessment. It was drafted in accordance with EU directives. The law stipulates that level of guarantee deposit be raised to €100.000 from the day Montenegro joins the EU”, said Mr Marković.

 

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