Raluca Tintoiu, the former head of NN Pensii, the company that received the biggest ever fine issued by Romania’s Financial Supervisory Authority (ASF), won the final battle in court against the authority.
The Supreme Court of Justice denied on Thursday, 26 November 2020, ASF's appeal and upheld the decision issued in October 2018 by the Bucharest Court of Appeal. The court decided to cancel the RON 100,000 fine imposed on Tintoiu, as well as undo the professional ban. It also ordered ASF to pay her EUR 1,000 in moral damages.
“We won, the decision issued by the Court of Appeal was upheld”, stated Cosmin Vasile, lead counsel and coordinator of the team of lawyers (Alina Tugearu, Andra Constantinescu) defending Raluca Tintoiu.
During Tintoiu’s tenure as the head of the company, NN Pensii was hit with the biggest fine in the history of the ASF for warning its customers about the public talks on the possible nationalisation of the private pension funds. In 2017, Tintoiu sent a newsletter to all the fund’s contributors, in which it asked them to carefully watch the Government’s and the political rulers’ intentions with the private pensions Pillar 2. She was sanctioned only two days later, after Social Democrat Party (PSD) leader Liviu Dragnea said it was not true the Government was planning to nationalize the private pension funds.
In April 2017, ASF issued a RON 750,000 fine for the company, withdrew Tintoiu’s general director license and gave her a RON 100,000 fine.
The withdrawal of the license meant that she could not take a top management position in the financial sector for the next 10 years, where all such positions are authorised by the ASF or the National Bank of Romania (BNR), or authorities in other countries.
Soon after her sanctions, three former ministers disclosed several options “were on the table” about the private pension funds. The Government ended up lowering the salary percentage transferred to private pensions from 5.2% to 3.7% in 2018.