Published: December 4, 2013
Big Russian financial group buys 24.17% Otkritie Bank stake from government.
Otkritie Financial Corporation (Otkritie), Russia’s second-largest financial group by assets and the majority stakeholder in Nomos Bank, has bought a 24.17% stake in Otkritie Bank from the State Corporation Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA). It paid RUB7.915bn (US$238.2mn) after winning an auction in late September.
The stake will now be transferred to Nomos Bank, which will see its stake in Otkritie Bank increased to 41.17%. This is in line with Otkritie’s strategy of consolidating its banking business with Nomos Bank as parent company.
Otkritie Bank, then known as the Russian Development Bank, was acquired by Otkritie in 2008 after the financial crisis brought it to the brink of collapse. The Bank of Russia and DIA supported that acquisition in line with a federal law designed to stabilise the country’s banking sector.
Also part of that stabilisation process was Otkritie Bank’s acquisition of Otkritie Investment Bank, Bank Petrovsky and Sverdlovsk Gubernsky Bank. The DIA’s withdrawal from Otkritie Bank signals the end of that process of recovery.