In September last year, the bank finalized a sale and purchase agreement with the shareholders of VBI, which includes Österreichische Volksbanken-AG, BPCE S.A., DZ Bank AG and WGZ Bank AG.
The selling shareholders have made capital contributions to increase VBI shareholders’ equity to alleviate the losses of the third quarter of 2011, between signing and closing period.
According to Sberbank, the deal has reached at €505m, from original €585m with a deduction of €80m.
As part of the acquisition, Sberbank has also assumed from VBAG, DZ Bank, WGZ Bank and BPCE the equivalent of ca. €2.1bn of long-term shareholder refinancing, and VBAG or a group of banks led by VBAG has provided Sberbank with five-year funding in an amount of €500m.
The recent acquisition has paved a way for Sberbank into international market, as VBI excluding VB Romania has 295 branches and over 600,000 clients.
Sberbank CEO Herman Gref said this transaction is an important step in Sberbank’s international strategy and in its journey for building a truly global financial corporation.
"Sberbank is uniquely positioned due to its capital and funding capabilities to benefit from a growth potential offered by Central and Eastern European countries. We are confident that Sberbank will build a strong platform for both organic and inorganic growth using VBI footprint", Gref said.
Sberbank obtained financial advice from Société Générale and J.P.Morgan, while PricewaterhouseCoopers and Oliver Wyman are advising the Russian bank on the integration process.
Sberbank accounts nearly 27% Russian banking assets and leverages its operations through 17 regional head offices and more than 19,000 outlets as well as subsidiary banks in Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus, a branch in India, and representative offices in Germany and China.
