Slovakia

The head of Slovakia’s central bank, who is a member of the European Central Bank committee that decides monetary policy for 20 countries, said Monday he won't step down despite bribery charges against him, the Associated Press reported. Peter Kazimir is accused of paying a bribe of 48,000 euros ($52,000) to the head of the country’s tax office in connection with a tax audit of several private companies. He faces up to five years in prison if convicted. It wasn't clear when a verdict might be issued. Kazimir said he considered the charges illegal and fabricated.

Slovakia may cut electricity exports to Germany and other European Union states unless the bloc’s governments meet its demand to modify an emergency energy proposal, the country’s premier said, Bloomberg News reported. EU member states are set to clinch a deal on the unprecedented package to intervene in the energy market at a ministerial meeting on Friday in Brussels. It includes a cap on lower-cost power producers’ revenue from electricity that Slovakia argues isn’t fit for its national power industry.

As of January 1, 2018, those who file a petition for declaration of bankruptcy of a company will face stricter liability in Slovakia, which could even result in their disqualification to sit on boards of Slovak companies, The National Law Review reported. In addition to the obligation to pay a contractual penalty in the amount of €12,500, an executive or board members who fail to file a bankruptcy petition will be liable for damages incurred by the creditors as a result of breach of such filing obligation.

A bankruptcy trustee has started an international tender to sell the assets of Slovakia Steel Mills mini-mill in eastern Slovakia, the trustee firm SSR said. The mill with annual capacity of 620,000 tonnes of steel billets and a rolling mill operation was opened in 2011 in the eastern town of Strazske, but fell into bankruptcy in 2015, and the operations have been mothballed, Reuters reported. "Subject of the sale of the properties represents mainly the key equipment, buildings, other operating assets supporting the production process," a sale notice on the trustee's website said.

Most of the creditors of the company Retail Value Stores, which operates retailer Carrefour, will not see their debts fully repaid after the creditors’ committee approved the restructuring plan for the company acknowledging only 3 percent of the debts’ value, The Slovak Spectator reported. The plan was approved by three members of the committee, while two were against it. Some 400 creditors of Retail Value Stores should meet at the so-called approval meeting that is scheduled to take place in 30 days, TASR wrote.

Private equity firm Penta Investments has made an offer for German insolvent drug store chain Schlecker, less than a month after buying a 40 percent stake in Polish retailer EM&F, Reuters reported. "We made a non-binding offer on Friday last week," a spokesman for Penta told Reuters on Friday, confirming a report in German weekly magazine Der Spiegel. He declined to provide details of the offer. Unlisted Schlecker, which competes with privately held peers Rossmann and dm, filed for insolvency in January after struggling to secure funds against a gloomy economic backdrop.

Slovakia finally ratified new powers for the euro zone's rescue fund on Thursday, the last country to do so, clearing the way for a bolder effort to arrest Europe's sovereign debt crisis, which threatens global financial stability, Reuters reported. The vote came 10 days before a European Union summit called to approve a "comprehensive strategy" to fight the crisis, expected to include action to reduce Greece's debt burden, a plan to strengthen European banks and measures to stop contagion spreading to larger euro zone economies.

The day after Parliament in tiny Slovakia voted to reject the expansion of a European rescue fund, causing the government to fall and threatening efforts to end Europe’s debt crisis, politicians there struck a deal that should permit the expansion of a rescue fund for the euro after all, the International Herald Tribune reported. The changes to the fund need to be approved in all 17 of the nations that use Europe’s single currency. Slovakia, a small former-Communist country of 5.5 million, is the only holdout.

Slovakia’s government became the first in the eurozone to fall over opposition to bailing out indebted economies after the country’s parliament voted down approval for enhancing the bloc’s rescue fund, the Financial Times reported. After hours of debate, the final vote on approving new powers for the €440bn European financial stability facility failed late on Tuesday evening with only 55 of the parliament’s 150 MPs voting in favour, causing the coalition government of Iveta Radicova to collapse. Slovakia is the last of the 17 eurozone countries to approve the improved rescue fund.