French CEO reacts in BRD fraud case as two of his executives face prosecution

French Phillippe Lhotte, president and CEO of Romania’s second largest bank BRD, which is part of French group Societe Generale, welcomed the progress made by Romanian anti-organized crime prosecutors in their investigation of the EUR 43.5 million fraud at BRD. However, he said he was surprised by the fact that two of his trusted deputies were under investigation in this case. Romanian businessmen and bank executives, involved in one of the biggest bank fraud cases in the last 15 years. “BRD salutes DIICOT’s progress in investigating the fraud against the bank. This investigation covers old loans that we made known to the authorities almost three years ago after BRD and Societe Generale internal control services had found them. BRD provisioned the financial impact related to these files entirely at that time,” Phillippe Lhotte said in a statement. The Romanian anti-organized crime prosecutors have started a criminal investigation on 30 people for setting up an organized crime group that defrauded BRD, Romania’s second largest bank. The estimated damage is more than EUR 43.5 million, representing the value of 17 loans granted to individuals and companies, which BRD didn’t recover. Romanian businessman Remus Truica, former Prime Minister Adrian Nastase’s chief of staff was the main beneficiary of the loans, and the prosecutors considered him to be the crime group leader. He’s under investigation for instigation to abuse of office and accessory to money laundering. His main connection inside the bank was Lucian Cojocaru, former commercial director of BRD’s network, who’s also under investigation. Two current BRD deputy general managers, Claudiu Cercel and Gabriela Gavrilescu, are also prosecuted for abuse of office, DIICOT announced yesterday. “I am very surprised that two of BRD’s current deputy general managers are investigated in this case, as BRD made no complaint against them. I maintain full trust in them, and I’m optimistic about the evolution of the case against them,” BRD’s CEO said. He added that BRD will continue to cooperate transparently with the authorities to help them finalize the case. editor@romania-insider.com