Speaking in a press conference in Bucharest, Erste’s Chief Financial Officer Manfred Wimmer said one or more of the five SIF minority stockholders in BCR would probably not be able to participate in the capital increase and that Erste’s buyout offer represents an alternative to the SIFs diluting their shares.
Wednesday, Erste said it has reached an agreement in principle with investment funds SIF Banat Crisana, SIF Transilvania, SIF Munteania and SIF Oltenia, but not SIF Moldova, to acquire 24.12% or 2.6 billion shares in BCR for EUR435 million in cash and stock via a series of transactions.
If approved by the stockholders of all four SIFs, the deal would increase Erste’s stake in BCR to 93.5%, from 69.4% presently.
However, it takes the shares of only one of the SIFs for Erste to acquire enough votes to approve a capital increase or to veto a possible listing in Bucharest of the Romanian bank.
Late April, BCR increased its share capital by 55.4 million lei (EUR12.9 million) to RON1.085 billion by including the entire profit for 2010. (EUR1=RON4.271)