The Director of Severnaya Kazna Insurance Company Alexander Merenkov actually admitted that Sistema Financial Corporation was now one of Bank Severnaya Kazna’s stockholders.

‘Given the current financial instability, the bank is naturally looking for an investor that would speak the same language we do, that would be good at employing high technologies, and whose arrival would allow the bank to build up its share of the market. At the moment, Sistema appears to be the most likely bidder who might become one of the bank’s shareholders,’ he said.

Alexander Merenkov preferred not to declare either the sum of the transaction of the size of the shareholding. He did explain, though, that this acquisition was not a part of the bank’s financial recovery program and was by no means a takeover of any kind.

‘This isn’t a takeover; it’s just Sistema’s acquiring a shareholding in the bank. Bank Severnaya Kazna gets to keep its name, its business approaches, its techniques, and its team. Vladimir N. Frolov is still the bank’s leader and identity figure,’ Merenkov announced at one of Yekaterinburg’s TV channels.

The executive explained the negotiations for the possible acquisition of the shareholding are being held personally by the bank’s BOD Chairman Vladimir Frolov, who has been in Moscow for the last few days. The transaction is to be finalized in the course of a few days.