First three cases of Triodos certificate holders at the highest Spanish court are favorable for Bank

In the first three cases of dissatisfied certificate holders who achieved his victories, Triodos has achieved victories in the first three cases. That made the bank Monday and Tuesday known and can also be read at the Catalan newspaper Macawn,,  » He writes to have seen Monday’s ruling.

According to the bank, the three statements create « an important precedent » for the many other lawsuits that Triodos still has against them in Spain. In the last annual report, the Bank from Driebergen mentions a total of 873 Spanish lawsuits, where lower courts have not yet made any statements in more than half of the cases. In the cases where there was already a judgment, the bank had won 208 and lost 219.

The lawsuits all revolve around Triodos customers who have purchased certificates from the bank – a kind of shares in the bank that until recently had no voting rights. The customers believe that they have not been properly informed about the risks of the financial products.

And those risks were great: at the start of the Coronacrisis, Triodos stopped the trade in the certificates – which the bank had made possible until then – because there would be too many sellers and too few buyers. During that period, the certificate holders could not reach their investment, while for some that was their entire retirement.

Only three years later the trade was resumed: no longer by the bank and at a much lower price. Where just before the trading of the trade certificates were for sale for 83 euros, it was the past twelve months for prices between 33.50 and 25 euros.

The Spanish Supreme Court ruled in the three things that have now been dealt with that Triodos has not made any mistakes in the ‘advertising brochures’ for the certificates (prospectuses). The bank therefore does not owe customers compensation.

Dutch law

According to ARA, the Supreme Court is partly based on The decision of the Enterprise Chamber in Amsterdam of March 2023. The judges wrote in that case of Dutch certificate holders – also won by Triodos – that in the prospectuses the risks of the certificates have been « extensively described and explained ». According to ARA, the highest court in Spain concludes that Triodos acted according to Dutch law.

In other countries, lawsuits of certificate holders against Triodos are also running. In the Netherlands, where by far the most of the 43,000 certificate holders come from, a group claim of 1,200 victims will follow this fall. They want full compensation. The bank recently received zero on the complaint during an attempt to get that group claim off the table.

Triodos offered all victims’ certificates at the beginning of this year 10 euros compensation if they further abandon lawsuits. How much of them will make use of it is not yet known: the registration procedure for this is open until 30 June.

June is also the month in which the Sustainable Bank hopes to get a listing for the certificates to Euronext Amsterdam. The hope is that a listing on the Amsterdam stock market will rise the price of the certificates again, because larger investors can then get in the sustainable bank more easily. Due to the current limited trade, the certificates are now mainly in the hands of (mostly older) private investors. The current lawsuits are a high risk for the success at the Triodos stock exchange, due to the possible impact of compensation on the bank’s capital.

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