IFC May Invest in Cap Hike of Serbia's Komercijalna Banka - Media

"IFC expressed serious interest in partaking, alongside EBRD and other international investors, in the upcoming capital hike," b92 (www.b92.net) reported on Thursday, quoting an announcement made after a meeting between State Secretary at the Serbian Finance Ministry Slobodan Ilic and IFC representatives held during the IMF/World Bank annual meetings in Istanbul.

No further details were immediately available.

Komercijalna Banka had a share capital of 9.08 billion dinars at the end of 2008, according to the bank's financial report for last year.

The bank posted a pre-tax profit of 870 million dinars ($13.8 million/9.3 million euro) in the first half of 2009, down from 1.3 billion dinars a year earlier. It ranked as Serbia’s second largest bank with 189 billion dinars in total assets at the end of June, data from the country’s central bank showed.

The bank's shares fell 2.59% to 36,251 dinars in a trading session on Thursday, bourse data showed.

(1 euro=93.0974 Serbian dinars)