Category: News

Cobalt has advised FN-Serviss on a cross-border merger of its group of companies in which the company’s Estonian subsidiary was acquired by its Latvian parent company.

According to the firm, the company’s Estonian subsidiary was acquired by its Latvian parent company.

FN-Serviss is a company in the Baltics specializing in fire safety and occupational health and safety.

The Cobalt team included Latvia-based Partner Gatis Flinters and Senior Associate Marija Berdova and Estonia-based Senior Associate Heili Haabu.

PeliPartners has advised Global Trade Center on the sale of Bucharest’s Cascade Office Building to Hungarian Crown Holding Kft.

GTC is a commercial real estate company in CEE. Crown Holding is a real estate investment company active in the Hungarian and Romanian real estate markets.

Developed in 2004, the Cascade Office Building is a class-A office building with a surface of 4,300 square meters.

PeliFilip – which split into PeliPartners and Filip and Company in 2019 (as reported by CEE Legal Matters on April 2, 2019) – advised GTC in 2017 when it acquired the building from Adval Properties for EUR 9 million (as reported by CEE Legal Matters on July 13, 2017).

The PeliPartners team was led by Senior Associate Antonia Nica and included Senior Associate Oana Bucsa and Associate Adelina Iordache, supervised by Managing Partner Francisc Peli.

PeliPartners said it cannot disclose the buyer’s legal advisor.

Havel & Partners has advised ZFP Investments on its acquisition of the Blumental Offices project from Corwin. Dentons advised the seller.

The office building is located in Bratislava and has 21,597 square meters of leasable area with more than 16,000 square meters of office space and almost 3,500 square meters of retail space.

ZFP Investments is an investment company, created through the merger of two companies operating in the Czech and Slovak financial markets. Corwin is a Slovak developer group.

“We are pleased to continue expanding our portfolio of Class A office buildings,” ZFP Investments Vice Chairman Peter Lukac commented. “The Blumental property meets all the requirements of a premium property and fits perfectly into our diversified portfolio.”

The Havel & Partners team included Partners Lukas Syrovy and Ondrej Majer and Associate Peter Kosecky.

The Dentons team included Counsel Martin Mendel, Senior Associate Peter Panek, and Junior Associate Alen Gondek.

Boyanov & Co has advised Yara International on the sale of Bulgarian and Romanian businesses Yara Bulgaria and Yara Digital Romania to the Nik Group. Wolf Theiss advised the buyer.

Yara International is a crop nutrition company that provides environmental and agricultural solutions. The company develops digital farming tools.

The Nik Group is a Bulgarian company that develops technologies for automatization and digitalization in the field of agriculture.

The Boyanov & Co team included Partners Yordan Naydenov and Stela Sabeva and Counsel Mihail Vishanin.

The Wolf Theiss team was led by Bulgaria-based Partner Richard Clegg and included Senior Associates Jasmina Uzova and Zhulieta Markova and Associate Staniella Todorova, as well as Romania-based Senior Associate Mihai Coada and Associate Costin Salaru.

Wolf Theiss, working with Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, has advised Raiffeisen Bank S.A. on its issue of RON 500,850,000 Senior Non-Preferred Eligible Sustainability Notes. Clifford Chance advised the joint lead managers.

Raiffeisen Bank International AG and Raiffeisen Bank S.A. were responsible for the placement of the notes as joint lead managers.

According to the firm, this is the first sustainability RON-denominated bond issue of a Romanian issuer, with a fixed annual coupon of 8.92%. The August 10, 2022 fiver year tenure placement is intended “to finance and/or refinance, in part or in full, new or existing eligible loans providing distinct environmental benefits (eligible green and social loans), with a minimum allocation to social categories of 50% and the difference up to 100% towards green categories, as further described in the Sustainability Bond Framework of Raiffeisen Bank S.A. (Romania).” It added that “the notes are intended to be eligible for MREL (Minimum Requirement for Own Funds and Eligible Liabilities) purposes and to be listed on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange and the Bucharest Stock Exchange.”

The Wolf Theiss team included Bucharest-based Partner Claudia Chiper and Senior Associate Andreea Tudorache and Vienna-based Partner Alex Haas and Senior Associates Nevena Skocic and Nikolaus Dinhof.

The Freshfields team included Vienna-based Partner Stephan Pachinger, Counsel Christian Joellinger, and Associate Benedikt Graf and Frankfurt-based Partner Christoph Gleske, Principal Associate Birgit Schulz.

The Clifford Chance team included Frankfurt-based Partner Sebastian Maerker, Senior Associate Wolfgang Ettengruber, and Transaction Lawyer Marlen Klepsch.

Deloitte Legal affiliated firm Reff & Associates has advised Bank of Cyprus on the sale of a portfolio of non-performing loans and repossessed properties in Romania with a face value of EUR 147 million to an entity part of the APS group. Tuca Zbarcea & Asociatii advised the buyer.

According to Reff & Associates, this is the largest deal of non-performing assets on the Romanian market in 2022. “The transaction was signed in May 2022 and closed on August 24, 2022, after being scrutinized by the Romanian Competition Council,” the firm added, explaining that “the sale of the residual Romanian portfolio of non-performing assets held by the Cypriot group was made in the context of Bank of Cyprus’ decision to wind down its operations in our country, which was gradually implemented over the last years.”

“This was the last key milestone transaction in our overseas deleverage plan, as we continue shifting our focus on serving our local market,” Bank of Cyprus Manager Corporate Finance Solutions Ioannis Petrou commented.

“The closing of this deal, which, based on publicly available information, seems to be the largest transaction of this kind on the Romanian NPL market in 2022, is a great success for our team, due to its high legal complexity and the very tight implementation calendar,” added Reff & Associates Partner Andrei Burz-Pinzaru. “We are very grateful to the bank for the trust they have shown us over the years of our collaboration and I want to congratulate my colleagues for their professionalism and the dedication they showed in this challenging project.”

The Reff & Associates team was led by Senior Managing Associate Andreea Serban and included Partners Burz-Pinzaru and Florentina Munteanu, Managing Associate Diana Stan, Senior Associates Iulian Maier, Alexandru Butusina, and Mihnea Radu, and Associate Danut Arion.

The Tuca Zbarcea & Asociatii team was coordinated by Partner Mihai Dudoiu and included Managing Associate Sergiu Negreanu and Associate Sorina Stefoni.

Schoenherr, working with Mannheimer Swartling, has advised Alfa Laval Corporate on its acquisition of Scanjet Systems.

According to Schoenherr, “this transaction adds Scanjet’s intelligent tank management solutions to Alfa Laval’s already broad tanker offering, creating a complete portfolio for cargo tank needs. Scanjet’s solutions and organization will become part of Alfa Laval per an agreement signed on June 16, 2022.”

Alfa Laval is a Swedish provider of heat transfer, separation, and fluid handling products. Its solutions are used to heat, cool, separate, and transport products such as oil, water, chemicals, beverages, foodstuffs, starch, and pharmaceuticals. Founded in 1883, the company has approximately 17,500 employees.

Scanjet Systems is a Swedish company that supplies equipment for marine, offshore and industrial applications. Scanjet has manufacturing facilities in Sweden, Poland, and Indonesia, with additional assembly sites in Norway and the UK.

The Schoenherr team was led by Poland-based Partner Pawel Halwa and Attorney-at-Law Stela Pavlova-Kaneva and included Attorney-at-Law Krzysztof Lesniak, Senior Associate Daria Rutecka, and Associates Francesca Velaj and Karolina Samocik, as well as Bulgaria-based Attorneys-at-Law Ivelina Vassileva and Elena Todorova and Associate Kristina Bozhinova.

Kocian Solc Balastik has advised arranger J&T IB Capital Markets on the issuance of unsecured unsubordinated book-entry bonds by J&T Energy Financing CZK, with a total value of EUR 750 million and an option to increase to EUR 2.25 billion.

J&T IB Capital Markets provides investment banking and advisory services in the CEE region, in particular, in the Czech and Slovak Republics. The company focuses on the debt capital market, equity capital market, and corporate finance transactions.

According to the firm, the bonds are set to trade on the Prague Stock Exchange, with public offerings in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. 

The KSB team included Partner Vlastimil Pihera and Lawyer Matus Kovacic.

KSB did not respond to our inquiry on the matter.