Several investment funds along with other portfolio investors became shareholders of the largest bank on the market, BCR, in late last year. This happened after the employees of the bank got the green light to sell their shares.
Two Dutch investment funds managed by Middle Europe Investment (MEI) along with domestic asset management company Certinvest show in the latest report on the bankes shareholder structure. The two funds of MEI own 0.03% in BCR, while Certinvest, the asset manager held by the Romanian-American Enterprise Fund owns 0.0001%. Securities firms HTI and Actinvest show in the same report as holding 0.01% and 0.002% respectively.
Against a BCR value of 7.7 billion euros as resulted from the equity swap offer made by Erste to the BCR shareholders last year and the latest quote of Erste on the Vienna Stock Exchange, the stake held by MEIes funds should be worth 2.3 billion euros, and HTI Valori Mobiliarees about 770,000 euros.
Erste, the majority shareholder of BCR had an offer running at the end of last year, whereby the employees were given three options for selling their shares. In the case equity swap, one Erste share was offered for six BCR shares. The latest quote of Erste was 58.35 EUR/share, which would translate into about 9.7 euros per BCR share.
The shares for cash option would have Erste offer 6.5 euros per one BCR share, which would put the value of the Romanian bank at 5.2 billion euros. The Austrians paid 7.65 euros per share to the state, according to the privatisation contract signed about a year and a half ago, which put the value of the bank at 6 billion euros.
"Our offer was probably more attractive than Erstees," stated Cristian FAder, the head of MEI funds for Romania. He added the shares had been bought while the Austrians were running their offer. He would not say how much the funds paid for one BCR share, though he did specify the acquisitions were paid for in cash. The HTI officials could not be reached for comment on BCR share purchase. Individuals now own only 0.68% in BCR, according to the information on the bankes website. Most of them are the employees that got the shares during the privatisation process, though the individual owner category may also include other portfolio investors that bought the shares from employees.
The shortage of investment opportunities on the capital market primarily caused by the low number of listings over the last few years along with trend to delist companies has made some portfolio investors look for opportunities among unlisted companies. Other than BCR, the acquisition list of the portfolio investors over the last few years has also included Romexterra Bank, taken over by the Hungarians at MKB through a tender offer last year and the compensation certificates issued by the Romanian state against the properties seized by the communist regime, which are supposed to be possible to convert into shares in the Property Fund.
"We are mainly relying on BCRes growth potential, because, unlike the banks listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, which were restructured, BCR can also grow as a result of restructuring to follow," says FAder.
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