One step before it’s over – her rescue deal ANEC in connection with its takeover “Attica participation”, after an agreement between all creditors to accept the corresponding offer submitted by “Attica” a year ago. According with sources “K”All ANEK creditors (banks, service companies and individual investors) are expected to sign within the next twenty-four hours, possibly even today, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) under which they undertake to cede their claims with a total nominal value of about 260 million euros, the company “Attika Participation” in the amount of about 80 million euros.

Piraeus Bank, which is a lender as well as a shareholder in ANEK (28.1298%) and Attika Participation (11.8445%) – and thus is expected to benefit from the shares of the new consolidated group – earlier this year also agreed to buy Alfa-Bank loans for ANEK. According to the plan being implemented, together with other creditors, it will refinance the remaining impaired debt and transfer it to a new, enlarged Attika Holdings.

ANEK’s creditors, in addition to Piraeus and Alpha Bank, are also Attica Bank with a very small share of cooperative banks and Cross Ocean Investment Fund, which previously bought back (at a significant discount) Ethniki’s loans for ANEK.

The current shareholders of ANEK will receive approximately 10% of the new, larger Attika Holdings.

According to the same sources in the banks, after the mentioned MoU was sent by the creditors Attika Participations and ANEC, the question remains for the evaluation and acceptance by their boards of directors. A development that is also expected in the near future interval. It is noted that based on the architecture of the agreement drawn up by creditors, all current shareholders of ANEK will receive approximately 10% of the new, larger Attika Holdings. At the same time, ANEK’s non-banking obligations to suppliers and third parties will be assumed and serviced by Attika.

The new group will control their brands Blue Starher Super fasther Greek sea routes And her ANEC. On the lines of Crete and the Adriatic, it will compete with the Italian Grimaldi group, and on the lines of the Cyclades and the northern Aegean there will be a “panspermia” of large, medium and small coastal shipping companies, market sources say. recalling that Attika and ANEK are already working in joint ventures in Crete and the Adriatic.

With the conclusion of the agreement and its implementation, the withdrawal of the historic Greek shipping company ANEK becomes possible. At the same time, Piraeus Bank, if everything goes smoothly, is expected to benefit both from its share in ANEK and from its share in Attika and, above all, from an increase in the total value of the latter, which, in turn, will strengthen the balance sheet of Attika’s parent company, Marfin Investment Group, in which Piraeus controls 31.1935% and is also its main creditor.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Shipping and Island Policy, as part of an effort to support Greek shipping companies at a difficult time due to the very large increase in fuel prices that have dramatically increased their operating costs, has already sent a letter to the Ministry of Finance to release the necessary loans and that the Ministry started to pay off state obligations, which amount to about 60 million, to all Greek shipping companies. These are the requirements of coastal ferries resulting from the implementation of public routes in recent years.