OTP Bank completes Bulgarian transaction

OTP Bank completes Bulgarian transaction

‘By purchasing Expressbank, OTP acquired a seamlessly operating, stable bank in Bulgaria’, said Sándor Csányi, Chairman & CEO of OTP Bank about the latest Bulgarian transaction of OTP Group at the press conference on the acquisition of Societe Generale Expressbank (SGEB) and its subsidiaries.

OTP Bank informed capital market participants on the website of the Budapest Stock Exchange that, based on the sales contract signed on 1 August last year by OTP’s Bulgarian subsidiary DSK Bank EAD and the Societe Generale Group, the financial closure of the transaction was complete. As a result, DSK Bank EAD acquired a 99.74% stake in Societe Generale’s Bulgarian subsidiary, Societe Generale Expressbank (SGEB), as well as a number of other Bulgarian subsidiaries of SGEB.

With its market share of 6.4%, SGEB is the 7th largest bank of the Bulgarian banking sector and, as a universal bank, an active financial institution in both the retail and the corporate market. As a result of the acquisition, OTP Group will become an even stronger market operator in Bulgaria. The integration is expected to be completed in 2020.

OTP Bank’s presence in Bulgaria dates back to 2003, and it has remained continuously profitable in the past 15 years, stressed Sándor Csányi. The parent bank, the Hungarian OTP ranked 9th among the banks participating in the latest stress test of the European Central Bank, which demonstrates that OTP is one of the most stable financial institutions of the EU. Mr. Csányi also mentioned that at present, OTP Group has a total of 18 million customers and 1,600 branches operating in 9 countries.

‘Our goal is to make OTP’s subsidiary the largest bank in Bulgaria’, he emphasised. He explained that OTP Group concluded a very good deal by purchasing Expressbank as it is an excellent bank, but Bulgarian households and the Bulgarian corporate clientele will also benefit from the transaction.

At the press conference in Sophia, László Bencsik, Deputy CEO of the Banking Group said that in 2017, Expressbank posted a balance sheet total of EUR 3.6 million and profit after taxes of EUR 56 million. Its corporate loan portfolio amounted to EUR 1.15 billion.