Financial services

A total of 45 tons of gold worth $1.7 billion have re-entered the Turkish economy through a number of gold collection campaigns, said Istanbul Gold Refinery?s Alternative Sale Channels-Gold Banking Director, Enver Ya?ar. 

The gold collection campaign started in 2010 with the attendance of one bank. There are now 11 banks in the system. 

Bulgaria's central bank has said its commitment and action taken so far create prerequisites for the timely finalisation of the acquisition of the branch nework of Greece's Alpha Bank in the country by Postbank, a subsidiary of another Greek lender, Eurobank.

Bulgaria's Postbank, a subsidiary of Greece's Eurobank, has announced the acquisition of the Bulgarian branch network of Alpha Bank, another Greek lender.

With the acquisition, "Postbank will strengthen its market position in the Bulgarian banking sector and expand its customer base in both the retail and corporate business banking segments," the bank said in a statement on Friday.

Greece-based Alpha Bank has sold its Bulgarian operations to Eurobank, another (temporarily closed) Greek for an undisclosed sum.
Alpha has 83 branches 744 employees in Bulgaria.
Eurobank’s subsidiary, Postbank Eurobank Bulgaria AD, will assume control. Alpha Bank sold its Ukrainian affiliate to Delta Bank in 2013.

Greek Euroboank, which owns 100% of Bulgaria's Postbank, will buy around 80 branches of Greek Alpha Bank in Bulgaria for EUR 1, according to a Eurobank official, as cited by Reuters.

The boards of the two banks are to meet Friday to finalize the deal.

Reuters informs that more than one-fifth of Bulgaria's bank assets are owned by Greek banks.

National Bank of Greece still plans to eventually hold a public offering for some of its stake in Turkey?s Finansbank and is continuing work towards a share sale, Finansbank said on July 15.

Dimitar Radev, the newly elected Governor of the Bulgarian National Bank (BNB), has announced that Kalin Hristov and Dimitar Kostov will remain Deputy Governors.

Tsvetan Vasilev, the main shareholder of Bulgaria's collapsed Corporate Commercial Bank, has denied charges he was running the bank as a Ponzi scheme.

Strenghtening banking supervision and evaluation of banks' assets are key to successful reform of Bulgaria's banking sector, a nominee for a new chief of the country's central bank has said.

According to Dimitar Radev, the collapse of Corporare Commercial Bank, or KTB, has shown that Bulgaria is lacking tools for the restructuring of banks.

Over half of Turkish people believe that they will face economic problems after they retire, so most have planned to keep working, according to a survey by AvivaSA and its partner Aviva in 12 countries.