Editor's note: The war is over

The government is presenting the closing of this conflict as a success. First of all, the investor promised that after the merger there would not be any job cuts for two years. Second, the Italians agreed to put 200 BPH units and the BPH brand name up for sale in an international tender.

Thanks to this solution, the bank that will come into existence as a result of the merger will potentially be weaker than the titan that could have been created, and which would have challenged the dominance of Poland's biggest bank, state-owned PKO BP - an eventuality that had the government shaking in its boots.

But was the months-long conflict worth the outcome? The answer is clear: It was not. It did Poland more harm than good. It was unnecessary for the Polish government to start this conflict, and then fan the flames. The results of the compromise, according to the majority of bank analysts, could have been obtained through regular negotiations, without the back-and-forth struggle dragging on for months.

Instead, the tiresome debate turned Poland into a rule-breaking renegade and an object of derision from international observers. Poland was the only EU member state blocking the pan-European merger of the Italian Unicredito (investor in the Polish lender Pekao) and German HVB (investor in BPH). The EU Commission has now threatened Poland with court proceedings and even though the war with the bank is over, Brussels still will not withdraw the charges it pressed against Poland for breaking the law on competition and free flow of capital in the EU market. 

Poland's image as a foreign-investor-friendly country has been impaired, and the signing of the compromise agreement will not automatically erase the negative associations from foreign markets' memory. That's a shame - because it takes much more time to build a good image than to destroy it.

Eliza Durka
Editor-in-chief