Thursday, Jun 14, 2012
BEIRUT (Zawya Dow Jones)--Kuwait's Capital Markets Authority, or CMA, has approved the offer of National Bank of Kuwait (NBK.KW) to acquire an additional stake in its 47.29% owned affiliate Boubyan Bank (BOUBYAN.KW), the Kuwaiti bourse said Thursday in a statement posted on its website.
In April, NBK said that it has received the approval of the Central Bank of Kuwait to increase its stake in Boubyan Bank to 60% from 47.29%.
The offer targets the owners of the nearly 921.6 million of Boubyan's shares that aren't already held by NBK, according to NBK's offer document posted on the bourse's website.
NBK, the Gulf state's biggest lender by market value, said in the document that it offers to buy the shares at 0.630 Kuwaiti dinar ($2.25) each or a total of KWD580.6 million. It added that the acquisition will be in cash and will be financed from its own resources.
The other partners in shariah-compliant Boubyan Bank are Commercial Bank of Kuwait with a stake of 19.18% and the general public with a stake of 33.53%, according to Zawya.com data.
NBK has a capital of KWD435.3 million while Boubyan's paid-up capital and authorized capital stand at KWD174.8 million and KWD174.9 million respectively, as per the offer document.
The Kuwait bourse said in a separate statement Thursday that upon the instructions of the CMA it has temporarily suspended trading in the shares of Boubyan Bank until June 18, due to the planned acquisition.
NBK's shares closed flat at KWD1.020 in a lower market.
-By Shikrallah Nakhoul, Zawya Dow Jones, +961 1 985757, shikrallah@zawya.com
Copyright (c) 2012 Dow Jones & Co.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
14-06-12 1428GMT
