Category: Greece

Clifford Chance is advising Citi on the sale of its consumer banking business in Greece, including the Diners Club of Greece credit card operations, to Alpha Bank.

The transaction, which remains subject to regulatory and other customary approvals, is expected to close in Q3 2014. The sale includes approximately EUR 430 million in GAAP assets, 480,000 customers, EUR 1 billion in deposits, and EUR 400 million in loans. Approximately 730 consumer banking employees and the Citi branch and ATM network in Greece will transfer to Alpha Bank.

The Clifford Chance team consists of Melissa Fogarty, Mark Carroll, Candice Hall, Graham Harrison, Kevin Ingram, William Sutton, Rebecca O’Brien, William Kalaher, Hywel Robinson, Matthew Preston, Greg Olsen, Anastasios Tomtsis, Alastair Woodland, Vanessa Marsland, Leigh Smith, Chris Davies, and Lisa Barningham.

Greek law advice is provided by the Moratis Passas Law Firm in the persons of Partner Dimitris Passas and Associates Vassilis Saliaris and Maria Karabella.

Citi’s lawyers included Joseph Tedeschi, Robin Schiff, Brian Cheng, and Constantine Casmas.

The Drakopoulos law firm in Greece announced today that it has merged with the Sinanides & Sinanides law firm.

Sinanides & Sinanides has been active in the Greek legal market for over 35 years. Hero Sinanidou-Sideridou, the founder and Managing Partner of her eponymous firm, is a leading authority in Gaming law. She will lead the Drakopoulos Gaming law practice across the firm’s 11 jurisdictions in Southeastern Europe, based out of the firm’s Athens headquarters.

George Sinanides, the co-founder at Sinanides & Sinanides, is one of the most prominent litigators in Greece, as well as a Lecturer in Civil Procedure at the Athens Law School and Deputy Director of Legal Services at Alpha Bank. He joins Drakopoulos as Of Counsel, will be the Head of the firm’s Litigation practice, while Maria Sinanidou, also as Of Counsel, will lead the firm’s Copyright practice. 

Papapolitis & Papapolitis announced that it advised Goldman Sachs International and Morgan Stanley & Co. International as joint global coordinators and joint book runners in connection with an offering by National Bank of Greece of 1,136,363,637 new ordinary shares at a price of EUR 2.20 per share designed to boost its core capital.

The total gross proceeds from the offering amounted to EUR 2.5 billion. Citigroup Global Markets Limited, HSBC Bank, Mediobanca – Banca di Credito Finanziario, Merrill Lynch International, and UBS Limited acted as joint bookrunners. The new ordinary shares are listed on the Athens Stock Exchange. 

Greece’s largest bank by assets got the go-ahead from bank bailout fund and 84 percent shareholder HFSF to raise funds to plug a EUR 2.18 billion capital hole, a central bank stress test revealed in March. The bank, with subsidiaries in the Balkans and Turkey, had previously resolved not to resort to the financial markets to fill the gap but focus on selling non-core assets instead. This changed after pressure by the central bank to follow the example of its peers Alpha Bank and Piraeus, which have already raised EUR 2.95 billion between them from markets. Eurobank, the country’s third-largest lender, is also tapping markets for EUR 2.86 billion, and has already secured commitments to the offer by a Canadian-led investor group for EUR 1.3 billion.

NBG’s equity offering will not include pre-emption rights for existing shareholders, including the HFSF, as was the case with share offerings by its peers. NBG’s board said the funds will also help it pay back EUR 1.35 billion worth of preferred shares held by the Greek state.

Papapolitis & Papapolitis lawyers working on the deal included Nikolaos Katsaros, Katerina Dalamara, Martha Fotinopoulou, and Nicholas Papapolitis.

The Drakopoulos law firm has announced the addition of Michalis Kosmopoulos to head the firm’s Intellectual Property Department across SEE.

Kosmopoulos joins from Giannoulas & Kosmopoulos, a IP and commercial boutique in Athens, which he co-founded and managed in 2008. Before that he was at Dontas Law Offices for 2 years, and spent another 2 years at Mikroulea, Chrissanthis and Partners. Kosmopoulos graduated from the University of Athens, where he also obtained his LL.M. 

In an official statement, Drakopoulos announced that “we would like to welcome Michalis as a new Partner in our firm and we are looking forward to his appointment further strengthening our Intellectual Property practice and enhancing our firm’s service offering and leading position in the market.”

The Kyriakides Georgopoulos Law Firm announced that it has severed its relationship with Partner Despina Doxaki and “mutually agreed to terminate our cooperation, effective as at May 16th, 2014.”

No further details were given, though the firm issued a statement explaining that “Partners Elisabeth Eleftheriades and Ioanna Antonopoulou shall henceforth be responsible for the handling of all matters related to project finance, PPPs and related matters.”

According to the firm’s website — which on the night of May 14th, at least, continued to list her as one of the firm’s partners — Doxaki “specializes in banking and finance.” Her bio on the KG Law Firm website continues that “she has worked with Standrook and Hooper, the EU, as in house counsel to KPMG (tax planning), Technical Olympic, C.I. Sarantopoulos, and Alpha Bank. Despina deals with project finance, corporate finance and banking transactions and has been involved in corporate restructuring projects as well as development of investment schemes. She has working experience in Greece, the UK and Belgium.”

Doxaki informed CEE Legal Matters that she is relocating to London to start working for an international firm, thought the name of the firm is not yet made public.    

Kyriakides Georgopoulos Law Firm Partner Gus Papamichalopoulos attended what the firm is describing as “the historic signing of the three concession agreements for hydrocarbons research in the areas of the Western Patraic Gulf, Ioannina, and Katakolo.”

The signing ceremony took place on May 14, 2014 at the Greek Ministry of Environment, Energy and Climate Change, where Minister Ioannis Maniatis signed the agreements in the presence of  Evangelos Venizelos (the Greek Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs), Edward Davey (Her Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change), and and other foreign dignitaries, market leaders, and energy experts.

According to the firm, the three concession agreements signed with three different concessionaires after unanimous approval by the tenders review committee were:

• For the offshore area of the Western Patraic Gulf — the concessionaire is the joint venture of Hellenic Petroleum, Edison and Petroceltic;
• For the onshore area of Ioannina — the concessionaire is the joint venture of Energean Oil & Gas and Petra Petroleum; while
• For the area of Katakolo (both onshore and offshore) — the concessionaire is the joint venture of Energean Oil & Gas and Trajan Oil & Gas.

The signing of these agreements marks the end of a two-year journey and paves the road for the first hydrocarbon research activities in Greece in decades. The area of Katakolo, in which reserves were discovered in 1982, expects to see production within the next three years.

Papamichalopoulos, Head of the Energy, Natural Resources & Utilities and Oil & Gas practice groups at Kyriakides Georgopoulos, was invited by the Ministry to join the signing ceremony. He also represented the Institute of Energy of South East Europe (IENE) in his capacity as General Secretary, along with Yiannis Hadjivasiliadis, the Chairman of IENE. 

The Kyriakides Georgopoulos Law Firm (KG Law Firm) has advised that a new agreement for the construction of ten public schools in Attica, through the use of Public Private Partnerships (PPPs), has been signed. KG Law Firm acted as the legal advisor to the group of lenders in this transaction.

The project includes the study, funding, construction, maintenance, and technical management of ten public schools for a period of twenty-seven years in the Municipalities of Athens (five schools), Heraklion (one school), Oropos (three schools), and Megara (one school).

J&P Avax, the contractor, will fund and construct all schools by May 2016. In addition, J&P Avax will remain responsible for maintenance and technical management of the schools throughout the life of the agreement.

The total cost of the investment is EUR 52 million and will be repaid by the Greek State upon the completion of the construction.

The project is jointly funded by the European Investment Bank and the Jessica Fund.  Financing is broken down as follows: EUR 16.7 million from the EIB, EUR 16.7 million from the Jessica Fund through the National Bank of Greece , EUR 8.7 million from Alpha Bank, and EUR 9.9 million from the contractor.

The agreement follows the signing of a related agreement on April 9 for the construction of fourteen schools, also in Attica. KG Law Firm is acting for the group of lenders in that transaction as well, with ATESE-Domiki Kritis as contractor.

The twenty four schools will service 6,500 students, with total funding of EUR 110 million. KG Law Firm claims that these are the first PPPs in the EU jointly funded by the European Investment Bank and the Jessica Fund, creating a European model for the financing of social projects.

Greek lawyer Alexia Hatzimichalis was promoted to Partner by Watson, Farley & Williams (WFW), one of 13 such promotions worldwide.

Hatzimichalis advises Greek and international banks, other financial institutions, Greek shipowning groups and US-listed companies on a wide range of ship finance matters.

The firm now has 133 partners worldwide. In addition to Hatzimichalis in Athens, the firm made three new partners in both its London and Hamburg offices, two in New York and Rome/Milan, and one each in Bangkok and Paris.  

Chris Lowe, WFW Managing Partner, said of the promotions that: “I am delighted to welcome these 13 highly talented lawyers to the WFW partnership. They all possess outstanding technical knowledge, as well as a steadfast commitment to providing the superior level of client service that underpins WFW’s success. They are great assets to the firm, who will all contribute to the continued growth and strength of our business. ”  

Lothar Wegener, another Managing Partner, stated that: “I congratulate these 13 outstanding lawyers on their promotions to the WFW partnership. In addition to highlighting our confidence in these individuals as practitioners, collectively this group of new partners underscores the ongoing strength of the firm as a whole, and the confidence we have in our respective practices.”    

Papapolitis & Papapolitis has advised the Intracom Holdings in the sale of its 49% shareholding participation in Intracom Telecom to investors in Dubai.

The value of the deal was EUR 47 million structured as a EUR 35 million cash payment and EUR 12 million as “additional benefit.” According to P&P, the “completion of the transaction is subject to a number of conditions, including necessary corporate approvals.”

Listed in the Athens Stock Exchange and with 4,806 employees, Intracom Holdings is one of the largest multinational technology groups in Southeast Europe, and includes Intrasoft International, Intracom Defence Electronics, Hol, and Intrakat. The buyer of the 3,802,623 shares that were exchanged was not disclosed. 

The P&P team working on the transaction consisted of Partners John Papapolitis, George Gravias, Nikolaos Katsaros, and Nicholas Papapolitis.

Holman Fenwick Willan has promoted Jasel Chauhan to Partner in the firm’s Piraeus office.

Chauhan specializes on corporate shipping and finance matters, including ship finance, joint ventures, hire purchase and leasing transactions, corporate restructuring and reorganization, shipping investment funds, shipbuilding and builder credits, interest rate and currency derivatives and security enforcement. He has also been involved in several high profile restructurings of Greek-based shipowners and managers in recent years. Prior to joining HFW, Jasel trained and then practiced at Nabarro as a general banking and finance solicitor with particular focus on property finance, acquisition finance, asset-based lending and securitization. 

Along with Chauhan’s promotion, the firm promoted another five lawyers to Partner in the firm’s London office. Richard Crump, HFW’s Senior Partner, said: “As we continue our strategy of growth in our core sectors, we are delighted to welcome to the partnership these high-calibre individuals, with the range of skills they bring. We are particularly pleased that we are seeing talent from across the firm come through the ranks, as we continue to strengthen the services we are able to offer clients.”