Romanian Government Fund Appointed Bancpost Custodian

Bancpost has been appointed custodian and custody agent of the "Proprietatea" Fund assets. The selection was been made following a tender for the supply of deposit and custody services for the Fund's assets. Raiffeisen and BRD Groupe Societe Generale also

By None

Bancpost has been appointed custodian and custody agent of the “Proprietatea” Fund assets. The selection was been made following a tender for the supply of deposit and custody services for the Fund’s assets. Raiffeisen and BRD-Groupe Societe Generale also participated in the tender.

Bancpost shall provide the safekeeping of all the “Proprietatea” Fund assets, the acknowledgement by the Manager of the Net Asset Value calculation, the settlement of transactions performed by the Manager on behalf of the Fund, using financial instruments and securities that have not been traded on a regulated market/ alternative trading system, as well as the settlement of corporate actions events.

The deposit service agreement has a validity period of one year and can be extended upon the Fund’s request.

Established by Decision of the Romanian Government, the “Proprietatea” Fund was created for the purpose of ensuring the financial resources necessary to compensate people who have been abusively expropriated by the State during the Communist period. Holding assets of 14.24 billion lei (over 4 billion Euro), the Fund is currently the largest Collective Investment Undertaking of Romania.

Its assets have been generated by transferring 88 state-owned stocks held in Romanian trading companies to the Fund’s portfolio. These assets will increase following the collection of receivables and recovery of certain rights of Romania deriving from trading and international cooperation agreements, but also following the sale of participation interests held by the State in Romanian companies.

Bancpost provides deposit services on the Romanian capital market since 1999, with customers who are part of the investment funds (open and closed) category and of the pension funds (private and optional).

Bancpost, which ranks fifth in the Romanian banking system in terms of assets, has increased in 2007 its total amount of assets to 13.42 billion lei, in comparison with 7.7 billion lei reported in the previous year. Still in 2007, Bancpost has also recorded a growth 20% higher than the average growth rate on the banking market, both in the corporate and the retail sector, reaching a 70% growth by the end of 2007 in terms of loan portfolios registered in 2006.

Continuing its upward trend in quality, Bancpost ended the first six months of this year with a net profit of 20.2 million EUR

«