An interview with the long-time Head of Legal at Eurostandard Bank in Macedonia

In addition to their traditional role guiding companies through legal and regulatory waters and managing disputes, General Counsels are increasingly called upon to provide input on strategic matters. An expert panel at the second annual Balkan GC Summit considered how this change in the nature of the General Counsel role is manifesting itself in the countries of the former Yugoslavia.

“The legal market is pretty stable,” reports Popovski & Partners Partner Tatjana Popovski Buloski. “The traditional concept of running a legal business that’s been present in North Macedonia keeps it like that. Not to toot our own horn, but the formation of our firm – and the discontinuation of my partnership with Polenak – was the biggest shift last year.” 

Former Polenak Partner Tatjana Popovski Buloski and several colleagues have left that firm to launch Popovski and Partners in North Macedonia.

The main characteristics of the Macedonian banking market are its small size and the relatively large number of players. According to the latest reports of the National Bank of North Macedonia, out of fifteen active banks, five have significantly higher market shares than the rest. The combined market share of these five biggest banks is 74.4%, with a significant discrepancy between the bank that owns the largest amount of assets (a market share of 22.7%) and the one with the lowest (a market share of 0.5%).

Former Wolf Theiss Poland Co-Managing Partner Ron Given has joined Deloitte Legal as its CE Senior Legal Counsel, responsible for all of the firm’s offices in 19 Central and Eastern European countries.

Doklestic Repic & Gajin has announced the establishment of Lex Adria, an alliance of independent law firms in the Adriatic region, to provide what the firm calls “seamless and premium legal support across the area.”

Motieka & Audzevicius has advised Petstart UAB on its exit from a joint venture with a Romanian PET packaging waste company. The buyer was advised by Karanovic & Partners.

It is no secret that North Macedonia is facing the issue of usage of products for plant protection which often fail to meet legal standards. Namely, Macedonian manufacturers producing agricultural products for human and animal nutrition often use unauthorized products which fail to meet safety criteria and may have suspicious origins. Although this issue is not as widely-discussed as air pollution in North Macedonia, it contributes significantly to the existing environmental pollution problem and has a huge impact on the health of plants, people, and the environment.

ODI has advised Turkish aircraft management and rental company Rey Airlines on the winding up of its Rey Airlines Europe LLC JV, which it established in partnership with a private individual in Skopje in 2016.

ODI has advised duty free shop operator ATU Macedonia on the granting of a EUR 0.5 million loan to its sole shareholder, Turkey-based ATU Turism A.S.

The Polenak Law Firm has advised the EBRD on its EUR 5 million loan to SME Aktiva, including transaction advice and security documentation in North Macedonia.

Boyanov & Co in Bulgaria, NNDKP in Romania, and the Polenak Law Firm in North Macedonia have advised Norway's LINK Mobility Group on its June 29, 2019 acquisition of all five of Allterco's telecommunications subsidiaries in Bulgaria, Romania, and North Macedonia. Bulgaria's Forlexa law firm reportedly advised Allterco on the deal.

Kinstellar has advised British steel-maker Liberty Steel on Romanian and Czech law aspects of its EUR 740 million acquisition of ArcelorMittal's European assets. 

Bojovic Draskovic Popovic & Partners and the other members of the South East Legal Alliance have become official partners of Italy's Grimaldi Alliance.

Macedonian lawyers Tatjana Shishkovska, Aleksandar Dimic, and Metodija Velkov have joined the Polenak partnership, working alongside Managing Partner Kristijan Polenak.

After the announced reform of the public procurement procedures in 2017, at the beginning of this year the National Parliament adopted the new Public Procurement Law (“Law”). This new piece of legislation embodies the current EU public procurement rules and sets the legal landscape which is expected to result with transparent and efficient spending of public funds. The Law entered into force on 1 April 2019, but its applicability will be de facto prolonged in practice due to the start of the presidential elections.

“The talk about the entrance of two regional players – CMS and Schoenherr – onto the Macedonian market last year is still on everyone’s lips (among lawyers),” says Apostolska & Partners’ Founding Partner Emilija Apostolska-Temov in North Macedonia, who says that the presence of such law firms in the market will undoubtedly influence business, increasing both the quality of legal services and competition. “It also gives us a hint about investments coming in – such big law firms would not come without any plans,” she says. “They must know something that the rest of us will learn later. I think it will be a positive experience.”