Directors and founders of 36 companies that received credits in PrivatBank as part of restructuring of its credit portfolio are current or former employees of the Privat Group, Director of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) Artem Sytnyk has said.

He said in an interview with Dzerkalo Tyzhnia.Ukraine (ZN.UA) weekly published on Saturday that during the credit restructuring at the end of 2016, the debt on credits of 193 old borrowers of PrivatBank was covered by new credits issued to 36 borrowers who did not have real collateral – only ownership rights to future supplies.

"They paid out the debt on the principals and credits rates of credits of 193 previous borrowers by new credits issued to 36 borrowers in the amount of UAH 4-4.5 billion on average. The difference is that among 193 borrowers some had real collateral – movable and immovable property. Here they have only ownership rights to future supplies of goods," Sytnyk said.

He said that the investigation is underway. NABU detectives will check 36 borrowers firms. The steps of the shareholders in the bank, employees of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) and managers of PrivatBank will be assessed.

"One of the aspects of the investigation is that the directors and founders of 36 companies that received credits in October-November 2016 are current or former employees of the Privat Group, from lower-level managers to technical workers of the enterprises belonging to the group. Therefore, we can only guess how this real director, this founder received a UAH 4.5 billion credit in the bank with 100% credit risk and did not provide anything, except for the mythical contract on supply of some goods in the amount consumed by the entire state during two or three years," the NABU director said.