Five bidders compete for Bank Permata
Five bidders compete for Bank Permata
Dadan Wijaksana and Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The government has short-listed five consortia vying for a
majority stake in Bank Permata, allowing them to carry out due
diligence investigations into the country's seventh-largest bank
by assets during a 30-day period, starting Thursday.
The five consortia, dominated by foreign investors, were
filtered out on Tuesday by the Asset Management Company (PPA)
from 10 interested groups of investors that had earlier submitted
their request for qualification (RFQ) letters.
"These short-listed bidders were chosen based on a thorough
examination of their financial strength and condition, good
business plans for Permata in the future and high preliminary
bids," PPA chairman Mohammad Syahrial told a media gathering
here.
The PPA is a government-sanctioned agency in charge of
handling assets formerly managed by the now-defunct Indonesian
Bank Restructuring Agency (IBRA).
The five are: a consortium of British Standard Chartered Plc.
(Stanchart) and Astra International; a consortium of Malaysian-
based Malayan Banking Bhd. (Maybank) and state pension fund
operator PT Jamsostek; Singapore's United Overseas Bank (UOB); a
consortium of Bank Panin and Australia and New Zealand-based ANZ
Ltd.; and Malaysia's Commerce Asset-Holding Bhd., which has
teamed up with local Bank Bumiputera.
The first consortium is an attempt by Stanchart, which obtains
a third of its earnings from Asia, to purchase a local bank.
The five consortia priced a 51 percent stake in the bank at
1.8 times to 2.39 times the book value, Syahrial said.
"However, their bids are just preliminary. We expect them to
increase the figures for their final bids after they have
completed due diligence later on," he added.
Of the 10 interested groups of investors, two failed to
present their initial bids. They are a consortium led by Bank
Rakyat Indonesia (BRI), which withdrew from the bidding, and a
consortium of Wachofia and Artha Graha, which did deliver its bid
but did so 38 minutes late after the Friday afternoon deadline.
Three other consortia -- Swiss First, Bank Mandiri and Bank
Buana Indonesia, and British Barclays Bank Plc. and Bank Danamon
-- failed to make the list.
PPA deputy chairman Raden Pardede said that the failure of
several local investors to make the list was simply due to the
higher preliminary bids offered by the others.
The short-listed bidders will have a month, once due diligence
has begun, to submit their final bids on Oct. 7.
The government has said it expects to announce the preferred
bidder some time in November, to be followed by a test of
suitability by the central bank, before finally declaring the
winner in the third week of December.
Meanwhile, Permata shares were up Rp 25, ending at Rp 975 on
the Jakarta Stock Exchange on Tuesday.
Permata was established in 2002 from the merger of five ailing
banks under IBRA control: Bank Bali, Bank Universal, Bank
Arthamedia, Bank Prima Express and Bank Patriot.
After the sale of the 51 percent shareholding, the government
plans to sell another 20 percent stake to public investors next
year, with all the proceeds from the divestment allocated to help
finance the 2004 state budget deficit.
The government has a 97.17 percent stake in the publicly
listed bank.