“Let them prove”: NAPC talked about negotiations with Hungary on OTP Bank’s work in Russia

The Ukrainian and Hungarian governments are negotiating to understand the reasons why the Hungarian OTP Bank was included in the list of international sponsors of the war. This was stated in the publication “Espresso” by the head of the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption of Ukraine (NAPC) Agiya Zagrebelska on minimizing the risks of corruption in the sanction policy.

According to him, under the guidance of Russian law, OTP Bank provided loans on preferential terms to “LDN” and Russians participating in the “SVO” on the territory of Ukraine. Anna Zagrebelskaya believes that this can be considered direct financing of the Russian army.

Important

“At the moment, we as the agency, our diplomats, the Hungarian government and OTP Bank are in the negotiation process. I hope this ends very soon, OTP Bank confirms and shows us that it has stopped giving preferential loans to the Russian army. Agiya Zagrebelska is committed to its plan to exit the Russian market with a short-term perspective. And we will be happy to remove OTP Bank from our list. The bank and Hungary have a way out of this situation.”

What is known about OTP Bank

OTP Bank is the foundation of the international finance group OTP Group. It has a leading position in the financial services market in Central and Eastern Europe. OTP Bank has subsidiaries in the following countries:

• Russia;
• Ukraine;
• Croatia;
• Slovenia;
• Slovakia;
• Montenegro;
• Romania.

So, in the Russian Federation, OTP is among the 50 largest banks, and in some areas among the leaders. The bank serves more than 2.2 million customers, the financial institution is represented in more than 1850 settlements, which shows its importance for the Russian economy.

It also ranks second in the POS credit market (credit disbursement at the point of sale of goods) with a market share of 15.3%, and ranks eighth in the credit card market.

On May 4, 2023, the National Anti-Corruption Agency (NAPC) added OTP Bank to its list of international sponsors of the war. The organization considered the bank’s stance not to stop working in the Russian Federation as direct evidence of support for the regime of Vladimir Putin.

Recall that on August 17, the Chinese conglomerate Alibaba Group Holding Limited was on the same list. NAPC explained its decision by the fact that the company still operates in the Russian Federation and sells stolen Ukrainian copper.