Employees and customers of the Cyprus Co-operative Bank are expecting the announcement of an agreement for the acquisition of the bank’s ‘good part’ with great anxiety. Their concerns are not limited to the substance of the deal since there are also practical issues that need to be tackled, especially regarding CCB employees: how many will continue working, where and in what posts, how many will be laid off and how will they be compensated?
Meanwhile, CCB customers and executives of both banks, but mainly of Hellenic, are worried about the consequences from the absorption of such a large volume of operations: €4.5 billion in loans and €10 billion in deposits will be transferred to Hellenic Bank. Hellenic will need to find ways to absorb hundreds of thousands of deposits and credit cards, face complications that may arise from customers who bank with both banks, manage different electronic systems, automatic cash registers, security codes and more. All this must be done smoothly and within a reasonable time frame. The most likely example to be adopted is that of the transfer of Laiki Bank’s operations to Bank of Cyprus in 2013.
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