Four companies join list of bidders for PNB

Four investment fund managers have been added to the growing list of prospective bidders for a 67-percent stake in Philippine National Bank valued at over P6 billion, industry sources said.

The four which have been pre-qualified for the bidding are: New Bridge, BA Marathon of Korea, Phil-Am Bank and Avenue Asia. This brings to 10 the number of interested bidders as listed by the Department of Finance (DOF).

Sources said the four new additions are in the process of conducting their due diligence studies. The process is expected to be completed by Aug. 10, two days before the scheduled Aug. 12 bidding.

US-based New Bridge introduced itself in the local banking community when it showed interest recently in Equitable PCI Bank.

BA Marathon, meanwhile, is a big export-import bank based in Korea.

The list of prospective bidders also includes Union Bank of the Philippines. Bank of Philippine Islands (BPI) used to be in that same list until it backed out following its acquisition of a substantial stake in Prudential Bank.

"We are greatly encouraged by the high level of investor interest in this joint sale," Finance Secretary Margarito Teves said. "This is a significant milestone in our privatization program and will help us partially recover the losses incurred by the suspension of the expanded value-added tax (EVAT)," he added

The Finance chief said PNB would continue to remain as a government depository bank until May 2007.

The government and the Lucio Tan Group (LTG) own about 45 percent each in PNB.

Based on a joint sale agreement signed by the two parties, the LTG is allowed to match the highest bid if the LTG accepts the floor price determined by the government and the LTG participates in the bidding process.

Last June this year, the LTG accepted the government’s floor price of P43 per share. The cigarette tycoon’s group should participate in the bidding process to have the right to match the highest bid.

PNB has 324 branches and offices in the Philippines and 97 branches, offices, and subsidiaries abroad.

The bank is the fifth largest domestic bank in the Philippines in terms of total assets, and is the market leader in servicing overseas Filipino workers’ remittances.