PETALING JAYA: Malayan Banking Bhd (Maybank) yesterday announced it was keen to buy an indirect stake in PT Bank Internasional Indonesia Tbk (BII).
Despite two earlier failed attempts to have a presence in Indonesia, Maybank is now seeking to acquire a stake in Indonesia’s sixth-largest bank, from the latter’s major shareholder, Fullerton Financial Holdings Pte Ltd. Fullerton is a unit of Singapore’s Temasek Holdings.
In a one-paragraph statement, Maybank said “it has indicated to Fullerton, the majority shareholder of BII, of its interest in acquiring its shareholding” in BII.
Maybank said it would make any further announcement at an appropriate time.
BII had on Feb 25 announced that Fullerton had informed of its decision to dispose of its interest in BII in line with Indonesia’s single presence policy.
Fullerton had expected to complete the sale before the regulatory deadline of end-December 2010.
Temasek is looking to sell its BII stake because the Indonesian central bank does not allow foreign investors from owning more than one bank. According to Reuters, Temasek also controls Indonesia’s PT Bank Danamon Tbk.
Fullerton holds 75% stake in BII’s controlling shareholder, Sorak Financial. Sorak, in turn owns 55.78% stake in BII. Reuters said Sorak’s BII stake could be worth about US$1.07bil at the current share price and Temasek’s 75% stake could be worth US$800mil.
BII has over 230 branches and 700 ATMs across Indonesia as well as a banking presence in Mauritius, Mumbai and the Cayman Islands.
In 2004, the Maybank-led consortium (comprising Maybank, Khazanah Nasional Bhd and PT Jaminan Sosial Tenaga Kerja) had failed to acquire a 51% stake in PT Bank Permata Tbk.
Last year, Maybank had signed a memorandum of understanding with Panin Life Tbk to commence discussion to acquire a 60% stake in PT Anugrah Life Insurance, a subsidiary of Panin Life. However, the Indonesian government told Maybank that it was unable to consider the acquisition.
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