The government’s consultants are expected to present their final arguments for the valuation of the former National Bank on May 5, with the bank’s shareholders hoping to be given the chance to challenge them during the final hearing expected as early as June.

Consultants Ugolino, Nun and Chilton drew up the government’s version of the valuation in June 2015, setting it at zero, while former banker Anthony Curmi, on behalf of the shareholders, argued that they were owed almost €325 million.

The government’s argument is that the bank was “illiquid and insolvent” and that it therefore does not owe a cent in compensation to the shareholders.

Photo: Chris Sant Fournier

But Mr Curmi’s report calculated that the National Bank was worth €61.4 million adjusted for inflation, and furthermore that the shareholders should be compensated for the income they would have derived – based on what the government got when it created Bank of Valletta to take-over from the National Bank.

He has argued that the government benefitted from around €430 million from that shareholding over the past 42 years, through everything from the current share price and dividends, to its sale of its shares to the public (Uni Credit’s shareholding is not included in this amount).

There are 350 shareholders from the former National Bank of Malta, which was taken over by the government following a run on the bank in 1973. These are being represented by the NBM Shareholders’ Association.

Court cases were instituted by shareholders and their heirs in 1992 against the Prime Minister, the Finance Minister and the Administration Council which briefly ran the bank in 1973.

In October 2014, the Constitutional Court of Appeal presided by Mr Justice Tonio Mallia, Mr Justice Noel Cuschieri and Mr Justice Joseph Azzopardi confirmed two judgments handed down earlier that year by Mr Justice Joseph Micallef. It confirmed that 82 shareholders’ rights were breached when they were forced to surrender their stakes without compensation.

Mr Justice Micallef has since then been hearing submissions from the two sides in an attempt to come up with the amount of the compensation that has to be paid.

Sources pondered whether he would try to find a technical expert to wade through the reams of testimony to come up with the compensation, with another source saying in such a case, should the two sides fail to agree on who the expert should be, the solution might be to have separate teams come up with figures which would then be averaged out.

Should the amount be substantial, the next problem would be for the government to come up with the funds, with Mr Curmi saying in the past that the most logical way to do this without affecting the Budget would be to assign an equivalent amount of BOV shares to the National Bank shareholders.