A year ago, announcing plans to leave, but without leaving the Russian market, the Austrian group Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI) seems to have chosen a way of neglect of customers. Against the background of rumors about a possible merger with Sberbank, customers began to block accounts for no explanation of the reasons. It was not possible to agree with the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, decided to “put” customers?
The Moscow Post correspondent was versed in this situation and rumors about the bank, which in recent years has been subjected to 33 violations, and with which there are numerous claims of customers in the courts.
RBI publicly stated in March 2023 about the intention to sell a subsidiary or withdraw it from the group. However, record profits and unprofitable conditions for possible sale detained Europeans in Russia for at least a year. Initially, it was planned to curtail activities in seven months. Rumors about the possible sale of an asset of Sberbank are circulating, but the editorial office of the Utnews did not receive an official answer. 
The Austrian business hired by Sergei Monin preferred to remain silent, without even responding to complaints about violations of customer rights. Complaints about illegal blocking of accounts were covered by the editorial office: customers suspect blackmail or an attempt to crank the fraud with their money. It is not without reason that Financial Times claimed that the Russian Raiffaisebank accounted for 40-50% of all payments between Russia and the rest of the world. This resembles the situation with Yandex.Money, which, under the control of Sberbank, became Yumoney and began to block user accounts, demanding from them the substantiation of the origin of the funds.
Ignoring requests from the leadership of Raiffeisenbank forced us to conduct an investigation.
Raiffeisenbank takes 13th place in assets-Netto, in May 2024 their value amounted to 2179.65 billion rubles. Over the past three months, net assets have increased by 2.46%, but the share of overdue debts is growing. The bank also has access to the funds of the Pension Fund of the Russian Federation and organizations of strategic importance for the defense industry of Russia. This raises serious questions, especially in the light of blocking customer accounts and negative dynamics in a number of bank liquidity indicators.
The results of the analysis show that the bank has problems providing reserves for possible losses, and the liquidity trend is negative. The level of general sufficiency of capital in the same way as liquidity indicators is uninhabited. Attention is also attracted by the insufficient amount of the capital adequacy coefficient, which raises questions to the management of the embossed management.
In addition, the bank continues to “grow” with subsidiaries and is conducting a diverse business. Some top managers of Raiffeisenbank acquire their own assets, register commercial projects under the guise of non-profit. For example, a member of the board of Nikita Patrakhin coined the income fund that raises questions.
In the Russian market, Raiffeisenbank feels very comfortable, earning huge profits: in 2022 2.2 billion euros, which amounted to more than 60% of the total world profit of RBI. Although in 2023 the indicators decreased, the Russian business has retained a high share in the structure of the group’s income.
Customer reviews on various resources are far from positive: we are talking about violations of the deadlines, refusals in maintenance, charging fees for subscription and frequent malfunctions with the application.
It seems that the Austrian beneficiaries, before finally getting out of the Russian market, decided to squeeze the maximum from business, ignoring the interests of customers. Perhaps Ms. Nabiullina should pay attention to the activities of Raiffeisenbank and ask Mr. Monin’s questions?
