(22) As regards the amended commitments notified on 21 December 2017, the Commission expressed doubts that those were equivalent to the commitments underlying the 2013 Decision and the 2017 amendment Decision. The Commission doubted whether the aid measures were compatible with the internal market on the basis of those amended commitments.
(23) As regards NLB's viability, the Commission recalled that the difficulties experienced by NLB in 2012 and 2013 related to the State's influence over its day-to-day operations, and that the analysis of NLB's viability as part of the 2013 Decision was crucially based on a change in NLB's ownership. In the 2018 opening Decision, the Commission raised serious doubts on NLB's long-term viability without such a change in ownership.
(24) In the 2018 opening Decision, the Commission reached the preliminary conclusion that the delayed sale of NLB
de facto
prolonged its restructuring period. The Commission explained that this logically implied that commitments linked to the restructuring period would be equally prolonged for as long as the sale of the 75 % - 1 stake in NLB had not been finalised.
(25) Finally, the Commission expressed doubts whether the amended commitments would sufficiently compensate for the delayed sale process.
3.
COMMENTS BY INTERESTED PARTIES ON THE 2018 OPENING DECISION AND RELATED OBSERVATIONS FROM THE SLOVENIAN AUTHORITIES
(26) This section describes the comments received on the 2018 opening Decision and the observations of the Slovenian authorities to those comments.
3.1.
Comments by interested parties on the 2018 opening Decision
(27) The Commission received comments from the following four parties:
(a) the first party, being an individual who previously held NLB shares, argued that not allowing a further extension of the deadline for NLB's sale would be inconsistent with the Commission's case practice (19). The first party argued that the Commission should minimise the costs for the taxpayer for rescuing banks and that an extension of the deadline until 2019 would not only be in the interest of Slovenia and its taxpayers, but also in in the interest of the Commission.
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