TIRANA (Albania), March 19 (SeeNews) – Albania's competition authority said it has approved the sale of the local subsidiary of National Bank of Greece (NBG) to American Bank of Investments (ABI), a unit of Albania's non-banking financial institution Tranzit.
“This transaction shows no signs of restricting competition on the relevant market,” the competition authority said in a statement on Friday.
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The sale is being carried out in the context of NBG’s restructuring plan and in-line with the bank's commitments towards the European Commission’s directorate general for competition, NBG said in a separate statement in February announcing an agreement for the sale was reached with ABI.
The deal is also subject to approval from Albania's central bank.
NBG Albania started operating in Albania in 1996 as Tirana branch of NBG. In 2012, it became a fully-licensed, independent bank and since then it operates as a 100%-owned subsidiary of NBG.
The assets of NBG Albania amounted to around 40 billion leks ($377 million/306 million euro) or 2.8% of the total assets of 16 banks operating in Albania, according to the Q3 2017 report of the country's central bank. The biggest banks in terms of assets in Albania are Banka Kombëtare Tregtare (BKT) and Raiffeisen Bank.
ABI is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tranzit, an Albanian non-banking financial institution focused on providing flexible financing options to companies and individuals. ABI is licensed to perform credit and deposit activities, payment services in Albania and abroad as well as other banking activities in accordance with Albanian laws.
In June, Belgium's KBC Group completed the acquisition of NBG's subsidiary United Bulgarian Bank (UBB) and leasing company Interlease in Bulgaria for a total consideration of 610 million euro ($730 million).
In December, Hungarian banking group OTP said it completed the acquisition of Serbia's Vojvodjanska Banka and NBG Leasing from NBG through OTP banka Srbija.
(1 euro = 130.845 leks)
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