Bank Modern to offer shares to foreign banks

JAKARTA (JP): The founder of the publicly listed Bank Modern plans to sell some of his shares in the bank to foreign banks in a bid to expand the bank's international network.

Bank Modern's chairman A. Samadikun Hartono said Thursday that four foreign banks had expressed interest in buying shares, which would account for around 20 percent of the total.

Samadikun, the founder of the bank, said that the interested banks included The East Asia Bank of Hong Kong. He did not name the other three.

The Samadikun family, which currently has a stake of around 85 percent in the bank, will remain a majority shareholder after the share divestment.

"If the foreign banks buy 20 percent of Bank Modern, the Samadikun family will still control a 65 percent share,' he was quoted as saying by Bisnis Indonesia.

In the first semester of this year, Bank Modern had total assets of Rp 2.41 trillion and paid-up capital of Rp 120 billion as of June 1997.

Total credit allocation was Rp 2.42 trillion (US$830 million) and pre-tax profit was Rp 18.81 billion.

Bank Modern's president, Bobby Sudarso, said that the bank expected to book a net profit of Rp 45 billion this year.

He said that Bank Modern would issue rights shares in October this year to raise around Rp 120 billion from the public and bonds worth Rp 500 billion in October to strengthen the bank's capital structure and its long term credit financing.

Samadikun said that PT Modern Finance, a finance company under the Modern Group, planned to offer around 25 percent of its shares in its initial public offering early next year. However, he gave no further details of the planned IPO.

He also said that Bank Modern would appoint Bambang Trianto, currently a senior executive at the central bank, Bank Indonesia, to replace Bobby Sudarso as president next month because Bobby Sudarso's tenure would come to an end at the end of this month. (aly)