Biography

Practice Experience

Andreea Balmus is a highly qualified lawyer, interpreting and applying national legislation for over 10 years, in both dispute resolution and consultancy, specialized in higher court appearances, dominant in civil and commercial law, with focus on insolvency and restructuring, tax and administrative, property and public law, criminal law.

In civil courtroom litigation, Andreea has expertise in conducting trials and pleading before the courts on legal subjects such as corporate contracts and partnerships, guarantee and negotiable instruments, manufacture and sale of consumer goods, matters relating to building construction (planning and developmental approvals and permits), real estate transactions (transfer of real property, deeds, mortgages and lease), enforcement procedure and also public tendering.

As a criminal lawyer, Andreea specializes in defense of individuals and companies charged with organized crime in tax fraud, money laundering, illegal drug trade and drug-related crime, tobacco smuggling, malfeasance in office, document forgery and public procurement crimes.

As a consultancy lawyer, Andreea provides advice in fields as real estate, concession, photovoltaic parks, public tendering, transfer of business, energy, by attending the due diligence projects and by assisting the clients during the negotiation and signing of the contracts.

Examples of significant clients recently represented by Andreea include:

• An agriculture company with 12,000 people in 35 countries. Is the overseas agriculture business platform for and China’s largest food and agriculture company.
• A leading international trading and services group with activities focused in the core segments of agriculture, energy and building materials.
• A South Korean integrated logistics and container transport company. The company was South Korea’s largest container line and one of the world’s top ten container carriers in terms of capacity. The shipping company formerly operated some 60 liner and tramper services around the globe transporting over 100 million tons of cargo annually.
• One of Israel’s leading and largest construction companies with vast experience in building residential projects and urban renewal projects.
• A company originally from UK, whose main activity is the wholesale trade of solid, liquid and gaseous fuels.
• A company that develops produces and distributes innovation PVC profiles-systems for windows and doors, incorporated in 1921, with turnover in 2010 of EUR 220 million.
• A company that develops designs and manufactures amusement park attractions that were sold all over the world.
• A construction leading company with focus on bridges and viaducts, closing various contracts with the Romanian state.
• AnotherItalian banking group. In 2014 it was the largest banking group in Italy by market capitalization, and second by total assets.
• An Israeli construction company, founded in 1975. Since the year 2000 the company expanded the range of activities to other fields: archive and storage services, entrepreneurship of real state abroad and construction and safety equipment.
• One of the most professional archiving companies in Romania. It is considered to be the safest archives repositoryin the country.
• A company leader in carrying out specific services of archiving domain, with more than 20 years of experience and 240 employees.
• A leading company with activities focused in wholesale trade of cereals, seeds feed and unmanufactured tobacco.
• A large company producing biscuits. The company has been incorporated in 1996, owns 400 employees and a production capacity of 50 tons per day. 

In relation to Real Estate, Andreea’s experience includes:

• Assisted the biggest transaction in agribusiness by purchasing a company that owns the biggest terminal of export in Constanta port with a capacity of 250.000 tons estimated at 100 million euro, as part of the team that performed the due diligence regarding the sale purchase of shares (review of the lease agreements, the concession contracts and awarding procedure for such concessions, as well as the compliance of the concessionaire with its obligations and correspondent ownership titles of the seller, review of the authorizations and licenses held by the seller, review of the lawsuits regarding the ownership titles and authorizations, as well as all other cases involving the seller pending before the court).
• Assisted other companies in transactions regarding several due diligences with respect to the negotiation, conclusion, amendment and termination of sale-purchase agreements, lease agreements and concession agreements.
• Assisted clients in the restitution of property procedures, administrative and contentious, to help landlords to recover their real estate assets that were abusively taken over during the communist era in Romania (including the restitution of buildings, forests, and immovable goods pertaining also to religious cults and national minority communities, governed mainly by Law no. 10/2001, Law no. 18/1991 and Law no. 165/2013 etc.) and sale purchase of such contentious rights.
• Assisted companies during real estate projects (starting with the administrative procedure of building permit, city planning certificate, during the construction works, until the acceptance upon completion of works and the final stage of sale of the real estate properties, including the subsequent civil actions regarding the entire building process submitted by distinct sub contractors).
• Assisted banks in due diligences regarding mergers of the two and/or with third banks, with focus on the mortgage rights and rights of pledge transmitted together with the contracts and/or debts, in Romania and the Moldavian Republic, including the registration of the collaterals in the Land Registry of the two countries.
• Assisted clients in due diligence and court claims in connection with ownership rights (by contracts by possession, by restitution), guarantee rights, lease contracts, work contracts, concession rights, superficies rights and in relation to property acquisitions, registrations in the Land Registry.
• Assisted the clients (including the state) in claims against the administrative acts issued by the state’s authorities and defending the state against the claims submitted by others having as object the documents issued by the authorities with relation to the city planning certificate, building permit, town planning and other documents in distinct matters (documents issued by different authorities of the state – City Hall, Prefecture, Local Council etc.).

In relation to Commercial agreements and Corporate, Andreea’s experience includes:

• Advised multinational companies in relation to setting-up of companies, subsidiaries and branches in Romania, as well as with regard to the obtaining of specific authorizations required for the operation of the local structures, modifications of constitutive acts, mergers and acquisitions, drafting of all the required documents and representing the clients before the trade registry for the registration of all the above activities.
• Advised Romanian and international clients with respect to the negotiation, conclusion, amendment and termination of various types of commercial contracts, such as sale-purchase agreements, lease agreements, service providing agreements, custody agreements, etc.
• Assisting the client on negotiations on distinct types of contracts and representing the clients before the courts of law and other authorities regarding commercial matters.
• Assisted clients in lawsuits regarding sale purchase agreements, lease agreements, mandate contracts, general contractor agreements, transport agreements, labor agreements, loan contracts, storage agreements etc.
• Assisted the clients during the enforcement procedure, recovery of debts by enforcement procedures or opposition in court against the enforcement procedures and court claims for precautionary measures, to ensure the possibility of debts recovery by the clients.
• Assisted the clients in cases in relation to payment instruments – payment order, check, promissory note.

In relation to the area of Tax and Administrative Law, Andreea’s experience includes:

• Assisted clients in relation to administrative complaints and court claims against the decisions issued by the fiscal authorities regarding the corporate tax and VAT, complaints against the institution of precautionary measures, obtaining temporary suspension of the protective measures set up by the state (seizure and garnishment measures on the clients’ accounts, on the movable and immovable goods).
• Assisted the clients in courts with regard to complaints against the decision issued by the fiscal authorities regarding the corporate tax in the reclassification of the daily allowance as income followed by an additional tax owed to the state.
• Assisted the clients in courts with regard to complaints for the recovery of VAT, for expenses made during the building projects, under the conditions of uncollected VAT, due to the non completion of the real estate projects.
• Assisted the clients (including the state) in claims against the administrative acts issued by the state’s authorities and defending the state against the claims submitted by others having as object the documents issued by the authorities with relation to the city planning certificate, building permit, town planning and other documents in distinct matters (documents issued by different authorities of the state – City Hall, Prefecture, Local Council etc.)

In relation to Family and Succession Law, Andreea’s experience includes:

• Assisting the clients in family matters and domestic relations, including marriage, separation of goods, divorce, annulment of marriage, property settlements, alimony, child custody and visitation rights.
• Assisting the client in matters related to child protective proceedings.
• Assisting the client in proceedings to establish paternity and the administration of paternity testing.
• Assisting the clients in proceedings regarding succession rights, wills, donations and settlements. 

In relation to Criminal Law, Andreea’s experience includes:

• Assisting companies and individuals before the National Anticorruption Directorate, Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism, Public Prosecutor’s Office and before the courts of justice.
• Assisted clients charged with organized crime in tax fraud and money laundering;
• Assisted clients charged with illegal drug trade and drug-related crime, tobacco smuggling.
• Assisted clients charged with malfeasance in office, document forgery and public procurement crimes.
• Assisted clients during the criminal investigation procedures, pre-trial detention, during the criminal trial and in relation to the execution conditions and procedures following the sentence.