Alvarez & Marsal: Bankers in Cyprus deleted fraud evidence
According to a report by consulting firm Alvarez & Marsal commissioned by the Central Bank of Cyprus. Bankers in the hard-hit Bank of Cyprus have destroyed evidence about abhorrent activities at the bank.
Review of banking sector
In the summer of 2012, the Central Bank of Cyprus hired Alvarez & Marsal to thoroughly examine the banking sector. The two largest banks in the country - Cyprus Popular Bank and Bank of Cyprus - were forced to seek state aid just before. As part of the review all employees were told that they couldn't erase any data or emails of the banks.
On the computers of two former executives of Bank of Cyprus (Andreas Eliades and Christakis Patsalides) very little or even no stored emails were retrieved from the years 2009 to 2012. Instead special software for deleting e-mails that does not belong to the standard equipment of the bank was found. It was said that massive amounts of data had been removed from the computer of Patsalidis. The computer of Eliades was completely empty.
Alvarez & Marsal documented the remarkable findings in its report. According to the Cypriot newspaper Kathimerini, the report of the consultants Contains "incriminating material against the former executives".
Fraud of Bankers
It's not the first time that Cypriot bankers are accused of fraud. A while ago several media, including the BBC, reported that data was deleted at other banks and financial institutions in the period 2007 -2010. This data eligibly was part of the acquisition of Greek obligations.
