Sovcom Group
Sovcombank
Sovcombank, the parent company of the Group, was established in 1990 in the city of Buy (Kostroma Region) under the original name “Buycombank”. In 2001 it was acquired by Sergey Hotimsky and Nikolay Jouravlev. In 2003 the Bank’s headquarter was relocated to Kostroma and the Bank was renamed to “Sovcombank”. Later, in 2004 it obtained general banking license and one year later entered the deposit insurance system. In 2006 Sovcombank set a course for rapid regional expansion. Sovcombank operates under general banking licence № 963 issued by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation (the “CBRF”). It also has licences for operations with securities and custody services issued by the Federal Securities Market Commission (the “FSMC”) on 7 February 2006.
ARKA Group
In 1993 the insurance company “Garantiya” (since July 2005 – «ARCA-Insurance») was founded. It provides services in sphere of credit risk management system for consumer finance since 1994. Since the long-term development and regional expansion strategy was worked out, in 2005, on the basis of OOO «ARKA-Insurance» regional divisions, ZAO «Association of Regional Credit Agencies» was set up, in order to create the chain of regional agencies. Later this year ZAO “ARKA” concluded a cooperation agreement with OAO CB “Regional Credit”, which was founded in 1992. OOO “ARKA-Insurance” shareholders purchased shares of OAO CB “Regional Credit”. In 2005, in order to strengthen the management team of credit agencies and insurance company, OOO “ARKA-Finance” was established. Later this year, international financial holding TBIH Financial Services Group, acquired control in ARKA Group. So, over the 1998 to 2006 period “ARKA-Finance” experienced rapid development of the credit agency network. At the moment of merger “ARKA-Finance” was a big regional financial company, operating in 16 Russian regions.
Consolidated company
In 2007 Sovcombank started funding ARKA loans. Later this year SCB and ARKA Group merged in order to build regional banking group with comprehensive product range and extensive geographical presence. Therefore SKB acquired 100% of ARKA Group, and the owners of ARKA acquired 50% of SCB assets.
The main idea of the Groups’ merger is to create a sustainably developing multifunctional financial institution with wide geographical coverage and wide range of banking services.
It also implies gradual transformation of credit agencies into a chain of bank offices, which will allow the Group to take place among top 20 banks in terms of number of points of sales.
Sovcom Group comprises Sovcombank and Novosibirsk group “ARKA-Finance”. “ARKA-Finance” consists of 13 regional credit agencies, bank “Regional Credit”, “ARKA-Insurance” and “ARKA-Leasing”.
This merger was organized by Deloitte and investment group “Russian funds”.
