Just a day after the chairman of largest bank in Cyprus resigned, the CEO of Bank of Cyprus, Yiannis Kypri and his entire board of directors has been sacked, according to reports from Cyprus news agencies. The executives were asked by Panicos Demetriades, the central bank governor, to tender their resignations based on orders from international lenders of Cyprus, European Union, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund.
Kypri said that he has not received a formal letter to this effect but was told verbally about the central bank’s decision on early Wednesday morning. He has worked at the bank of several years and was took the post of CEO last year.
The drastic shakeup in the bank’s management comes in wake of the appointment of a new administrator at the Bank of Cyprus. Dinos Christofides, the new administrator, will be granted special jurisdiction to overlook the execution of the 10 billion euros bailout approved for the European island. Christofides was appointed on Monday, he has four decades of experience working as an accountant and a banker.
As part of the rescue plan meant to salvage the debt-ridden economy of Cyprus, the country will shut down its second largest lender, Cyprus Popular Bank or Laiki. Bank of Cyprus will absorb the good parts of Laiki and all of its debt. Additionally, units of Bank of Cyprus will be sold to Greek banks and most importantly, hefty deposits in both of the Cyproit banks would be taxed to raise 4.2 billion euros for the bailout funds.
Yesterday Andreas Artemis, chairperson of Bank of Cyprus, resigned based on the way the torika and Cyproit government chose the fate of his bank without consultation with its board. Four other members of the BoD had also given their resignations yesterday. The board did not accept the resignations at that time.
Meanwhile the banks in Cyprus have stayed closed for more than ten days now. The banks are expected to start business tomorrow with some restrictions on cash withdrawals, exporting euros, a blanket ban on cashing checks. Moreover the fixed term deposits will be frozen till maturity.
