Alpha Bank A.E. said it has enough demand for all its stock as the Greek lender joined Piraeus Bank SA in selling 3 billion euros ($4.2 billion) in shares to bolster capital.
Alpha Bank will price the sale at 65 euro cents apiece, it said in a statement. Piraeus Bank stock is being offered at 1.60 euros to 1.75 euros, said two people with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be named while the transaction is on. The sale has enough demand for all the shares, they said.
Piraeus Bank, the country’s second-largest lender, said in a statement yesterday it plans to raise 1.75 billion euros and Alpha Bank is targeting 1.2 billion euros from new shares.
The sales represent “a vote of confidence for the Greek banking system,” Maria Kanellopoulou, a financial analyst at Euroxx Securities SA, said in an interview. “Major progress has been achieved, especially for those two banks.”
Investors are returning to Greece as it makes a comeback from an international bailout that roiled world markets. Greek lenders need to boost their capital by 6.38 billion euros after six years of recession and the biggest sovereign-debt restructuring in history left them with swelling bad loans, the nation’s central bank said this month.
(source: bloomberg)
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