Sberbank started working in Crimea

Sberbank's ATMs appeared in Crimea, and offices will open in major cities in the first half of the year, the bank said. Sanctions, which since 2014 prevented from entering the peninsula,no longer an obstacleSberbank headquartersSberbank headquartersSberbank headquartersSberbank headquartersSberbank headquarters

Sberbank began work in the Crimea, the first offices will open in the largest cities of the peninsula in the first half of the year, RBC was told in the press service of the credit institution.

Sberbank has formed a team and is starting to work on the Crimean peninsula.

it also notes that the first ATMs in Crimea have already been installed, all services will become available within a year.

Sberbank's net profit for the year amounted to ₽300 billion Finance

Calls for Sberbank to start working in Crimea have been made repeatedly since 2014, after the peninsula was annexed to RUSSIA, but Sberbank did not open offices in new regions due to fears of sanctions - in 2014, the largest Russian bank fell under sectoral sanctions , but not under the most restrictive blocking constraints. “You must understand that our presence in Crimea automatically means that we will be subject to a very wide range of sanctions, not only those that are now,” German Gref, HEAD of the bank, said in 2017.

However, on February 24, the day the Russian special military operation in Ukraine began, Washington added Sberbank to the CAPTA sanctions list, which implies restrictions on correspondent accounts in the United States , and already in April it fell under the most severe blocking restrictions, which imply a complete disconnection from the DOLLAR system. Similar sanctions were also imposed in the spring and summer by the United Kingdom and the European Union. The bank emphasized that restrictive measures would not have a significant impact on its work and would not affect the service to the Russians.

But because of the sanctions, Sber actually lost its European business - assets in Austria, Germany, the Czech Republic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Hungary, Serbia and Slovenia. The European Central Bank warned at the end of February that three of its structures (Sberbank Europe AG, which controlled subsidiaries in several EU countries, Slovenian Sberbank banka dd and Croatian Sberbank dd) faced a significant outflow of deposits and "become bankrupt or have such a prospect" . In early March, the Austrian Financial Markets Authority banned Sberbank Europe AG from continuing its activities, the shares of the Croatian subsidiary were transferred to Hrvatska Postanska Banka, the Slovenian - to Nova ljubljanska banka by decision of the regulators. Now Sberbank is challenging these decisions in the COURT of the European Union. The bank also had a "daughter" in Switzerland,

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President Vladimir Putin said in March that after the imposition of sanctions, all Russian companies and banks would be able to operate in Crimea. “Now there are all conditions for large Russian business structures, which, frankly, used to be afraid of some kind of sanctions… Now they [business] have nothing to fear,” he said. “Now they can safely come, including, by the way, banks, to the peninsula and actively work in the region.”

In April, Promsvyazbank, which fell under sanctions, already began work on the peninsula. At the same time, the head of VTB Andrey Kostin said that the state bank was considering various options for working on the peninsula - perhaps it would only be investment activity. Later it became known that the Crimean RNCB would be attached to VTB along with Otkritie (a deal with the latter should take place in the first quarter of 2023). In November, Kostin said that VTB plans to work in Crimea on the basis of RNKB: “We will work in Crimea, of course, but for now on the basis of RNKB, when its transition to VTB Group ends in the first quarter.”