Govt's sells remaining stake in BCA
Urip Hudiono, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The government sold on Wednesday its remaining 5.02 percent stake in Bank Central Asia (BCA), the country's second largest lender by assets, reaping Rp 2.19 trillion (US$219 million) in proceeds for the state coffers.
Head of the state-owned Asset Management Company (PPA), Mohammad Syahrial, said the stake was sold for Rp 3,550 a share, or a 2 percent premium on the shares' closing price on Tuesday.
Trading of BCA's shares at the Jakarta Stock Exchange were suspended on Tuesday for the sale, with their prices ending steady at Rp 3,475.
Investment firms Bahana Securities and Deutsche Bank AG had helped manage the sale.
"With the sale, the government no longer has any shares at BCA," Syarial said. "Proceeds from the sale will be submitted to the government as revenue for the 2005 state budget."
PPA deputy head Raden Pardede said that PPA had received bids for the 618,236,200 shares on offer from a total of 11 overseas and local investors, oversubscribing the shares 1.24 times.
"Almost all -- 99.7 percent -- of the investors who finally bought the shares were foreign investors," Raden said, without specifying who they were as they were still being listed pending the settlement of the sale.
San Francisco-based hedge fund firm, Farallon Capital Management LLC, currently controls BCA, with a stake of 52 percent.
Farralon had bought a 30 percent stake in BCA for Rp 5.37 trillion during the government's initial offering in March 2002, before again raising its stake to 52 percent in February last year, when the government again sold a 1.48 percent stake at the bank.
The government managed to raise Rp 1.55 trillion at the time, along with its sale of a 7.85 percent stake in Bank Danamon, 5.65 percent in Bank Niaga and 1.99 percent in Bank Internasional Indonesia (BII).
The government had injected Rp 52.7 trillion into BCA in an attempt to bail it out following the 1997 Asian financial crisis, effectively taking control of the bank from its previous owner the Salim Group.
Wednesday's BCA sale was the government's second attempt this year, after bids from investors during the first on March 23 failed to meet the government's expectations.
The cash-strapped government is selling its remaining stakes in banks and other firms it acquired after the crisis to plug the budget deficit, which this year is estimated to reach Rp 25.1 trillion.
Following BCA, the government will likely offer its remaining 5.53 percent in BII, the country's sixth largest lender.
Syahrial however said that the government was in no rush and would not be hasty in the BII offering.
"We will wait for right moment in the market," he said.