ANZ Considers $4b KEB Stake

Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ), Australia's 4th largest lender, is on the lookout for buyout deals to expand and may be looking to buy a $4 billion stake in Korea Exchange bank (KEB).

U.S. private Equity fund Lone Star is looking to sell its stake of South Korea's 6th largest lender. KEB shares increased by 2.5 percent with Lone Star's 51 percent ownership of the bank worth about 4.54 trillion won ($4.06 billion) at Tuesday's stockmarket close. Lone Star had appointed Credit Suisse to oversee the KEB stake sale process.

ANZ Bank currently has a Tier 1 capital ratio (which is a financial measure of its ability to absorb potential losses) of 10.5 percent as of Dec. 31. The stake would give the bank control of a lender in an economy that’s forecast by the central bank to grow 5.2 percent this year, the fastest pace since 2006. Recently, ANZ Bank agreed in August to pay $550 million to acquire RBS’s units Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, Hong Kong, the Philippines and Vietnam.