About 420 million lei of the sum stolen from the financial-banking sector has been recovered so far owing to the common activity of the law enforcement agencies. The figure does not include the money recovered by the National Bank of Moldova, which said that 1.219 billion lei, plus the sums that were in accounts during the intervention, has been recovered since the licenses of the three banks – Banca de Economii, Banca Socială and Unibank – were withdrawn. The information was presented in the October 12 sitting of Parliament, where the managers of the National Anticorruption Center and the National Bank of Moldova were questioned, IPN reports.

National Bank governor Sergiu Cioclea said in Parliament that 1.260 billion lei has been repaid to the Ministry of Finance by September 30. 18% of this sum come from the sale of owned assets, while the rest from the sale of pledges, repayment of loans or forced financing that represents 21% and benevolent financing that represents 58%. The liquidators instituted civil proceedings against all the parties involved in the fraud. These are fraudulent debtors, managers and shareholders.

Sergiu Cioclea noted there were started 45 criminal cases in which the National Bank, through the banks under liquidation, represents civil parties. There are another 137 lawsuits by which the central bank claims the non-repaid loans. The 213 insolvent debtors owe over 4 billion lei.

National Anticorruption Center director Bogdan Zumbreanu said the stolen banking funds were divided as follows: 7.74 billion lei is the damage caused by effective beneficiaries the criminal cases against which were sent to court; 1.9 billion lei is the damage cashed by identified beneficiaries the criminal cases against which are to be sent to court, and 1.06 billion lei is the damage caused by beneficiaries that haven’t been yet identified.

Bogdan Zumbreanu stated the conducted analysis helped them identify the assets that belong to effective beneficiaries and the sums that derive from the banking fraud. A number of 22 enterprises are involved. A sum of 420 million lei has been transferred so far to Banca de Economii after selling these assets. Now the investigation bodies are to identify the profile of beneficiaries so as to determine where the money was hidden, converted or spent already.

The banking fraud was committed in 2007-2014. The damage caused to the three commercial banks that were consequently liquidated entailed the intervention of the state and the allocation of 13.34 billion lei from budgetary funds.