The Bank of Russia has announced an open auction to sell a stake in Asian-Pacific Bank (APB) on March 14.
The Central Bank of Russia decided to sell 99.99999833333333% of the bank’s shares through a public auction in digital format, with the price reduced until a buyer is found (Dutch auction) on March 14, 2019, at Sberbank AST electronic trading platform, the regulator said on its website.
The starting price of the stake is RUR 9.857 bln ($148.4 mio), and the minimum price RUR 6 bln ($90.3 mio).
According to the regulator, it is going to sell 30,931,745,644,677,827,058,361,147 (thirty septillion nine hundred thirty one sextillion seven hundred forty five quintillion six hundred forty four quadrillion six hundred seventy seven trillion eight hundred twenty seven billion fifty eight million three hundred sixty one thousand and one hundred forty-seven) (99.9999983333333333%) of APB’s ordinary registered shares.
The Bank of Russia acquired the mid-sized lender last April through a financial recovery procedure.
“Following financial recovery and the introduction of a new business model, the bank’s financial condition stabilized; a new capital was formed, and the outflow of client funds stopped. The bank restored its solvency and stable profitability,” the Central Bank said.
On November 19, 2018, the ACRA agency assigned the bank a BB+ (RU) credit rating with an “evolving” outlook.
In September-November 2018, the Central Bank recapitalized APB by RUR 9 bln ($135.5 mio) and increased its ownership to 99.99% through an additional share issue, as was previously reported by Vesti.Economika.
Earlier, Deputy Chairman of the Bank of Russia Vasily Pozdyshev said the regulator was negotiating with potential investors. It is planned to sell the bank until the end of 2018.
APB is one of the largest and socially significant regional banks in Siberia and the Russian Far East. According to the Central Bank, APB ranked 60th in terms of assets among Russian banks (RUR 120 bln ($1.8 bln) as of April 1, 2018).
In April 2018, during an inspection, the Bank of Russia exposed a financial pyramid at ATB: the bank was selling FTK factoring company’s promissory notes without reflecting these operations in its financial statements. The total amount of debt on the company’s notes amounted to RUR 4.3 bln ($64.7 mio).