Iceland's Kaupthing Bank will close early.

The shareholders' meeting has just decided that.

This puts savers under time pressure who still want to assert claims against the insolvent bank.

The bankruptcy of the Icelandic bank with its high deposit rates for German savers was almost 14 years ago.

However, the claims against the bank are not yet time-barred.

Daniel Mohr

Editor in Business.

  • Follow I follow

At first, investors had to tremble for months as to whether they would get any money back at all.

Because the bankruptcy of the previously rapidly growing bank had caused a financial crisis in Iceland and called into question the solvency of the entire country.

The deposits were later repaid by the state Icelandic deposit insurance fund, but without interest - a difference to the German deposit insurance system, which always reimburses the accrued interest up to the day of insolvency.

It was not until 2015 that Iceland decided to also refund the interest.

With interest rates of more than 5 percent, the bank had advertised in a public and successful way, especially German savers.

However, many investors have not noticed the possibility of having the interest reimbursed.

Those who did not become active themselves did not get any money back.

Ten years from 2015 are time to claim interest.

Then the statute of limitations begins.

Only five employees left

But now the bank will be closed before the statute of limitations expires in 2025.

On November 3rd, the relevant committee of Kaupthing Bank is due to make a final decision on all claims made up to October 5th.

The bank will then close its doors.

In the end she had five employees.

In 2008 there were hundreds of employees and the bank had grown rapidly internationally before the financial and real estate crisis led to insolvency.

Around 5,000 of the formerly 34,000 German investors still have interest claims against the bank.

Only those who made demands on the bank after the bankruptcy in 2008 can take action.

He is thus on a list of creditors and can contact the bank with his name and account number, a "claim number", and claim his interest.

A standard claim filing form must be used, in English, and a copy of your ID will be required.

The documents should be submitted to Kaupthing Bank, Borgartún 26, 105 Reykjavik, Iceland.

The company Epic Global, which was previously entrusted with the settlement, is no longer active following the decision to close the bank.

Here readers had reported that under the email address kaupthinginfo@epiqglobal.

Those who do not wish to contact Kaupthing Bank themselves can also use the services of Black Pine Capital.

The Austrian financial institution has exercised the right to view Kaupthing's list of creditors and, on this basis, is now seeking direct contact with savers who still have claims against the Icelandic bank.

At Kaupthingzinsen.de, savers can also contact Black Pine directly.

The saver cedes his repayment claims to Black Pine and, following Kaupthing Bank's decision on 3 November, will receive half of the interest claims.

It has nothing to do with the settlement process.

Black Pine collects the other half for organizing the settlement.

Manuel Müller estimates the average claims of around 5,000 German savers to be 600 euros on average.

He is the managing director and employs a team of three colleagues exclusively for the Kaupthing savings interest.

After that, the only option is to sue

In the first half of the year, 269 savers made claims to Kaupthing.

The Viennese Black Pine handled 230 of them.

The Frankfurt subsidiary Pine Investments specializes in buying up troubled bonds in which there is little or no stock exchange trading, for example from Air Berlin, KTG Agrar or Solar Millennium.

Pine also occasionally buys stocks that have been delisted.

The sale can make sense for investors who otherwise fear not getting anything for their securities.

A sale can also be worthwhile for tax purposes, in order to be able to claim the losses in the tax return.

Anyone who does not take action in the matter of Kaupthing by October 5 then only has the time-consuming legal action against Kaupthing within the limitation period until 2025.

Unclaimed claims fall to Kaupthing's shareholders, including German banks, one of which has just voted to end Kaupthing Bank early, putting some pressure on its own customers.

Former bondholders of Kaupthing Bank who had invested more than 200,000 euros in the Kaupthing bonds became shareholders.

Anyone who chooses to go via Black Pine must take action soon, because the company will be posting its claim notifications to Iceland on September 22nd.

After this date, no more documents will be accepted.