One hundred million-dollar puzzle

The liquidators of the Banca Internationala a Religiilor (International Bank of Religions – BIR) celebrated one year since the bank was officially declared bankrupt by putting up for sale the pride of the former House of God and of money: the letters on the bank’s doorplate.

After having run into trouble early last year, BIR went bankrupt with a $100 million loss, which the two liquidators, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Reconversie si Valorificare Active (Assets Reconversion and Capitalisation), are trying to recover by selling everything they can.

“Where did we get the idea of selling the letters from? Well, since we have to sell practically everything and we have already sold cars, houses, equipment, TV sets and dishes. We’re selling it all.

We have focused on recovering debts so far, but now we will start selling buildings. We even sold an axe at the branch in Timisoara and we have got lots of calls from people asking: is this for real? Are you selling axes? If we can make money of it, why not?,” explains Lucian Groza, lawyer with SC Reconversie si Valorificare Active SA.

According to papers, each letter cost $20 to install back in 1993. The name turned out to be valuable only for its letters and is worth nothing today.

“I do not know where they got them, maybe Honolulu, why they were so expensive, because it’s just copper plate, which I could not sell for more than 700 lei per kilo. All 200 letters from the five branches in Bucharest would bring us no more than $500, if somebody buys them as scrap metal,” Groza says.

To whom it may concern, the letters available are those in the bank’s name “BANCA INTERNATIONALA A RELIGIILOR” and the bank’s motto “NIHIL SINE DEO”.

So that there are some 35 As, 30 Ns or 40 Is available. The options are limited, though, as the supply lacks F, U or M, from – Heaven forbid, BANKRUPTCY (“faliment” in Romanian)!

BIR’s liquidators may say that this is the moment when the liquidation business turns serious.

A year has passed since the bankruptcy was declared, but less than ten percent have been recovered from the total amount claimed by the creditors: 3,000bn lei in face value, which converted into USD would amount to some $100 million.

The $500 collected from the sale of the letters are only the first step. And even the longest of ways begins with the first step, according to a Chinese saying.

“We expected the appeal filed by the bank against the bankruptcy decision to be tried first. In all this year since the executory decision was delivered (July 11, 2000) we have tried to recover debts, especially since real estate market is low. But we are taking full action now,” says Arin Octav Stanescu, an attorney at law with Reconversie si Valorificare Active.