Court unexpectedly holds assignment of SAP's Russian debts to be lawful
The Moscow Arbitrazh (Commercial) Court held a transaction to assign the debts payable to the Russian subsidiary of the German developer SAP (SAP CIS) to the Russian law firm Legat to be lawful, according to a court award published in late November regarding a claim brought by the Krasnodar company Ferroni. Thus, the court effectively allowed Legat to collect money from former SAP customers.
This decision departs from usual court practice in similar cases, where rights of claim are transferred from a resident of an unfriendly jurisdiction to a Russian entity in order to circumvent counter-sanctions regulations, experts say. Normally the courts hold such assignments to be invalid.
After SAP left Russia in 2022, a number of companies still owed it money for using its products. In 2023, SAP CIS filed a lawsuit to recover these debts, but in 2024 it sold the claim rights to the Russian law firm Legat. Among SAP CIS's debtors, apart from Ferroni, were the IT company CROC Incorporated, Zenit football club, the O'KEY grocery chain, Georgian pharmaceutical company GEPHA, energy company T Plus, a Rosatom entity, and others.
Legat purchased debt claim rights worth RUB 2 billion from SAP CIS, paying only 3% of the nominal value, or RUB 60 million, for the portfolio.
Ferroni pointed out that on the date of the assignment agreement, a temporary procedure for fulfilling obligations to certain foreign rights holders was in effect, established by Russian Presidential Decree No. 322, which required payments to rights holders from unfriendly countries to be made only through special O-type accounts. According to the plaintiff, the agreement to purchase the debts at 3% of their nominal value was intended to circumvent the provisions of the decree, and therefore the transaction should be voided.
However, the court found that the plaintiff had not provided any evidence that SAP CIS had abused its rights when concluding the assignment agreement or had violated the plaintiff's property rights or legitimate interests.
Thus, until the assignment is challenged, the payment must be made to the procedural successor, i.e. the Legat law firm, Kommersant notes. Ferroni has filed an appeal, RBC reports.
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20.01.26