Bulgarian CEZ Buyers – Insolvent Borrowers with Debts to Revenue Agency Mind the horns!

Until recently, Ginka and Slavcho Varbakovi, the infamous business couple from the southern city of Pazardzhik, who won the tender for the Bulgarian business of the Czech State-owned power utility CEZ, would not have been able to obtain bank loans. It turns out that there are three collection cases against them. Their properties have been foreclosed and sold for non-serviced debts. The family also has debts to the National Revenue Agency (NRA), which are still outstanding.

This emerged from a check by Bivol in the Property Register after Ginka Varbakova announced she has the trust of a powerful credit institution that will finance the acquisition of CEZ Bulgaria with hundreds of millions of euros.

One of their loans is from First Investment Bank (FIB or Fibank) granted for the acquisition of properties in Pazardzhik. The repayment of the loan apparently did not happen as scheduled because the properties had been foreclosed and sold by private law enforcement agents. The bank had bought them back, according to case file 20148870400197 of private law enforcement agent Dobromir Daskalov.

The Pazardzhik properties of Ginka and Slavcho had been sold at a public auction due to an unpaid mortgage to Fibank.

Outstanding debts to DSK Bank and the NRA

It is also apparent from the Property Register that to date the family has outstanding debts to the NRA, for which a distraint of their property had been registered in the Black Sea city of Varna. Another private law enforcement agent is dealing with this debt and the case is entered under number 20108100400161.

In 2013, first the city of Dobrich District Court (see here, in Bulgarian) and then the Varna Court of Appeals had dismissed a claim against the enforcement case on the grounds that the amounts due to the NRA were not for property taxes but for other types of public receivables.

Perhaps this debt to the NRA stems from the successful energy business of Ginka and Slavcho. Slavcho Ivanov Varbakov and the Pazardzhik company BG ENERGY, managed by Ginka and Slavcho until April 2013, are listed as co-debtors in the enforcement case. After April 2013, they had been replaced as BG ENERGY managers by Ginka’s sister, Teodora and Slavcho’s sister, Malina.

There is no information in the Property Register showing that the foreclosure of the property of Slavcho and Ginka for their debts to the NRA had been lifted.

However, this property had already been foreclosed by DSK Bank in another enforcement case with number 20107900400076, again for unpaid debt.

The amount of debt to DSK is not specified in the Property Register.

According to the Property Register entries at the Registry Office in Varna, the distraints on the property of Slavcho and Ginka have not been lifted to date as well.

However, this does not necessarily mean that Slavcho and Ginka’s debts to DSK and the NRA remain outstanding.

Ginka to BTA news agency: We are reliable and have potential

“Inercom owns assets and has a credit reputation that allowed us to use attracted funding. The assets of our group are valued at about BGN 100 million.”

This is what Ginka Varbakova said on Saturday, February 24, in an interview with BTA. According to her, she is the sole owner of the companies that will acquire the assets of CEZ in Bulgaria and which have a total of 20 employees and are registered with a capital of BGN 50,000.

There is, however, a shocking mismatch between Ginka’s pompous statements and the real credit history of the family and its business.

Despite its not-so-glorious credit history, the family expects to receive a loan in the amount of hundreds of millions of euros from an international bank:

“When doing business, it is important what one offers, how trustworthy one is and what potential one has. We were chosen in an extremely difficult procedure that attracted many international participants, and which was organized and conducted in accordance with the laws of the Czech Republic. We, as well as all other candidates, went through many due diligence steps and had to meet a number of requirements by the seller – CEZ and its majority owner – the Czech state. We have provided numerous documents, audits, financial and commercial information requested in the process of this procedure. We have proved that we have the experience and capacity to acquire and manage the companies that CEZ is selling,” Varbakova says in the interview, which has no author and there is no picture of the businesswoman.

There is no indication whether the due diligence by CEZ and the Czech state has discovered the non-performing loans of the family, but in any case, they are not a good attestation.

Indeed, for banks, it is really important how reliable the applicant is. For example, if anyone with Ginka’s and Slavcho’s credit history, tries to obtain a small consumer loan, every bank will look at them with suspicion and will ask for a collateral.

Whether the same lending rules will apply to a loan in the amount of hundreds of millions of euros or they will be more lenient for Ginka’s “dream team” from Pazardzhik, will become known when the details of the financing of the deal become clear.

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