Eurobank’s Hellenic Bank stake at 56%
The public offer of Eurobank to the shareholders of Hellenic Bank expired on Tuesday, without any substantial result in terms of increasing the percentage controlled by the Greek group in the second largest Cypriot bank.
The announcements are expected on Wednesday alongside the publication of Eurobank’s second-quarter results, and according to sources, Eurobank’s stake is determined at close to 56% – i.e. marginally above the stake it controlled at the start of the public offer. Investment fund Dimitra, which controls 21.3% of Hellenic, did not participate in the public offer, and neither did the Union of Bank Employees of Cyprus, which are the two main shareholders after Eurobank.
The public offer was made at 2.56 euros per share – that is, as much as the large institutional shareholders of Hellenic agreed to sell the shares for – and corresponds to a total value for Hellenic Bank of approximately €1.1 billion.
The board of directors at Hellenic disagreed with the relevant proposal, considering that the offered price “is not fair and reasonable from a financial point of view,” based on the report of an independent expert.
