MOSCOW, April 29 (RIA Novosti) – VTB Bank, Russia’s second largest lender by assets, has secured firm commitments from three sovereign wealth fund investors for its Secondary Public Offering (SPO) worth 102.5 billion rubles ($3.3 billion), the lender said on Monday.
“VTB Bank has received firm and binding commitments from a group of investors comprising existing and new shareholders, including three prominent sovereign wealth funds: Norges Bank Investment Management (the Kingdom of Norway); Qatar Holding LLC (the State of Qatar); and the State Oil Fund of Azerbaijan, SOFAZ (the Republic of Azerbaijan), to subscribe for the entire amount of the offering,” VTB said in a statement.
On April 26, VTB Bank’s Supervisory Board approved a decision to increase the Bank’s equity capital by the issuance of 2.5 trillion new ordinary shares. The new shares will be offered at a price of 0.041 rubles per share or about 9 percent under the market value of the bank’s stock.
The offering is intended to help VTB Bank meet required capital adequacy levels and “strengthen VTB Bank’s shareholder base by introducing substantial new strategic investors and reinforcing links with existing major institutional shareholders,” the bank said.
The shares will be placed via an open subscription and will be admitted to trading on the Moscow Exchange. The bank’s existing shareholders will have the preemptive right to acquire new shares proportional to the number of shares held by them as of April 26, 2013. The preemptive rights period is expected to run from May 6 to May 17.
Russia’s Central Bank approved on Friday the bank’s prospectus for the new share issue.
After the new share offering, the stake held by the Russian government, which will not participate in VTB’s SPO, will fall from the current 75.5 percent to 60.93 percent, if investors buy up the entire amount of the new share offering.
“We are delighted to announce the capital increase and are pleased with the transaction structure. Binding commitments to subscribe from major global investors have allowed us to secure our capital raising targets,” VTB Chairman Andrei Kostin was quoted as saying in the statement.
