Delyan Peevski is taking the battle for the properties of Glorient Investment BG into his own territory. Glorient Investment is the owner of the buildings and facilties of Technomarket Bulgaria.. On Thursday, 14th July, last week, after recent acquisition by Peevski atwo claims were submitted at Sofia City Court by Technomarket, against Glorient Investment BG and Magnum – D. Details of the claims were found after a search of the Sofia City Court site. The complaint against Magnum – D relates to the property in Bozhurishte which was purchased from Glorient Investment at the end of 2015. Technomarket previosuly had a store at this address, but they signed an annex for early termination of the rental contract and left voluntarily. Glorient Investment BG has been forced to sell the building in Bozhurishte to pay off their bank loans. The claim against Magnum – D, inter alia , is a direct blow against the competition because the company owns Techmart chain of stores which also operates on the the black and white electrical goods market.
According to informed sources, five more complaints have been submitted by Technomarket Bulgaria in Ruse, Sandanski, Blagoevgrad, Haskovo and Burgas. This move marks the beginning of a legal battle over 14 properties, where Technomarket currently operates. Pressure increased at the beginning of the year when NSN Investment, which is also owned by Delyan Peevski, became the main shareholder in Technomarket Bulgaria. Peevski is refusing to pay rent to Glorient Investment for the buildings where his stores operate on the grounds that the properties are actually owned by Technomarket. Last week Peevski submitted his claims to court.
Glorient was established for the purposes of real estate activities and over the years, it has become specialised in constructing business and logistic parks. To date it has competed 27 projects in 17 Bulgarian cities. In 2006, Glorient purchased 13 units from Technomarket: consisting of land and buildings in construction and completed businesses. . These deals have resulted in the separation of the business operation of Technomarket and the management of the stores.The finished establishments were leased out by Glorient. They also completed construction work on others and built new stores on the empty plots of land. The company event went so far as to construct new stores at the request of Technomarket. These stores were built on sites indicated by Technomarket and would be then leased from Glorient As of 2016, neither party disputed the transaction, nor the title, nor their joint operations. Glorient Investment has been receiving rent from the properties for almost 10 years. It has been paying tax and relations have been running smoothly. However, problems began to appear after Peevski’s appearance on the on the business “horizon” this year Nevertheless, in 2006 Glorient acquired 13 establishments from Technomarket, Peevski claims to have title to the 14 buildings housing its chain. Glorient Investment, on the other hand, have declared that they possess contracts for the purchase of the properties. They also have documents in support of the payments made arising from the transaction and their title deeds are recorded in the Property register. This, however, does not seem to perturb Peevski. Technomarket’s overdue liabilities to Glorient l now amount to more than 1.7 million EUR. In the meantime, Glorient has paid the requisite VAT arising from its invoices into the state budget. The total amount of VAT paid on the unpaid invoices now amounts to 312 000EUR. The major shareholders in East Balkan Properties such as Utilco Emerging Markets, Newray Limited and Hellet House, which hold 40% of Glorient Investment, , have already brought this case to the attention of the British, American, French, Dutch and the Finnish ambassadors to Bulgaria. Technomarket’s actions can no doubt be seen as a sign from the Bulgarian oligarchs to foreign investors. The case is yet to be resolved and thelawsuits will probably rumble on for years. . During this period shareholders will continue to lose 300 000 EUR paid in VAT on unpaid rents. They suspect that they will ultimately win the lawsuits, but in the meantime Technomarket will forced into bankruptcy and there will be no one to compensate the chain for the losses sustained.
