The Court of Chancery of Delaware (Judge Slights) has denied the motion of former owners of PrivatBank Ihor Kolomoisky and Hennadiy Boholiubov to dismiss Privatbank’s case against its former owners regarding the recovery of losses caused before 2016, which alleged that the case must be considered by the courts of Ukraine (forum non conveniens), the press service of the bank reported on Aug. 25.
“According to the decision, the Court of Chancery will continue consideration of the case No. 2019-0377-JRS pursuant to the civil claim of JSC CB PrivatBank against Ihor Kolomoisky, Hennadiy Boholiubov and other legal entities and individuals, concerning the compensation of damages caused by the defendants to the Bank prior to its nationalization in December 2016,” the bank said.
The court also granted Privatbank’s motion and entered a status quo order, prohibiting any actions outside the ordinary course of business with various assets of the defendants in the United States.
The press service said that this order, in the words of the court, is “warranted to provide Plaintiff proper security for the more than $600 million in damages it seeks in this action.”
Simultaneously, the court granted the motion of the defendants to stay the case in part until related litigations in Ukraine are resolved.
As reported, in May 2018, PrivatBank initiated a case in the Court of Chancery of Delaware against Kolomoisky and Boholiubov and other legal entities and individuals. Optima Acquisitions, Optima Group, Optima Ventures, Optima 55 Public Square, Optima One Cleveland Center, Optima 1375, Optima 1375 II, Optima 1300, Optima 777, Optima Stemmons, Optima 7171, Optima 500, Optima 925 (all are LLCs) and Optima International of Miami, Inc. are among the defenders.
In addition, the press service of PrivatBank told Interfax-Ukraine that the bank had filed two amended statements of claim to the relevant court proceedings, and also clarified that the amount of dubious transactions claimed in the statements, taking into account additional ones, is about $750 million.
