The biggest Romanian-held insurance company on the domestic market, Asirom, could soon be sold. Several European financial groups are reportedly interested in the company, including OTP (Hungary), Uniqa (Austria), Generali (Italy) and Wiener Staedtische (Austria), insurance market sources say.
Businessman Ioan Nicolae, who controls the company through his Interagro Group, last autumn commissioned audit and consultancy firm KPMG to appraise the company.
At the time, Asirom was on the wanted list of the Hungarian bank OTP, an institution that had entered Romania by buying RoBank. Acquisition of Asirom would have allowed OTP to create an integrated financial group, their declared intention for Romania.
As soon as the talks were completed, Nicolae began standard sale procedures. KPMG completed their appraisal and invited interested companies to submit bids "in principle".
Although expected for quite some time, the start of the sale caused unrest on the market. Bidders include Generali, OTP, Uniqa, Wiener Staedtische and the Czech company Ceska Pojistovna.
Once the initial bids are submitted, Interagro will select one company to commence final negotiations with and perform due diligence.
Interagro representatives say the "request to KPMG is in no way a move towards the sale of Interagro's stake in Asirom; instead it exclusively concerns an audit report whose purpose is to provide exact knowledge of the company from the domestic insurance market and how it compares against other insurance companies in Central and Eastern Europe."
The only company that has clearly stated its interest in Asirom at the moment is Wiener Staedtische, which controls Unita and Agras.
"Yes, it is true that we have been contacted. They have a written offer from us on their desk. We are waiting for a serious answer," said Dan Odobescu, Unita's general manager.
How much is this offer worth? "It is a basic offer. Many things are not known as yet. Depending on the answer we get, we will have an audit, perform due diligence and go on with the negotiations," explained Odobescu.
Asirom is not the only company being eyed by Wiener Staedtische, which announced plans for further purchasing in Romania as early as last year.
Why makes Asirom so attractive? "Market share and nothing else," said Odobescu. Uniqa, one of the largest insurance companies in Austria, made no comment as to their possible involvement in Asirom, though they confirmed their interest in Romania.
"A few years ago, Uniqa defined the Central European region as a strategic market, not including Romania. Because of the positive development of the Romanian economic landscape and the EU negotiation prospects, we are now contemplating the Romanian insurance market as well, though at a very general level," said Konstantin Klien, CEO of Austrian Uniqa Group.
Generali representatives made no comment, while OTP said they still planned to build an integrated financial group in Romania but did not go into details. sorin.pislaru@zf.ro
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