Woori Bank sale on hold; KDB unit privatization starts

The sale of Woori Bank faces another delay as global financial market volatility has increased risk aversion among potential buyers, a key official overseeing the sale process said Sunday.

“Market conditions have greatly changed. We need to alter our sale strategy regarding Woori Bank,” Yoon Chang-hyun, cochairman of the Public Fund Oversight Committee, said in an interview with Yonhap News Agency.

“Middle East countries are hit by low oil prices, while a sense of crisis is fast spreading across Europe. If you push for a sale under these circumstances, it’s pretty sure that you won’t get the best offers,” he added.

Woori Bank, the country’s second-largest lender by assets, is 51 percent owned by the government as a result of a nearly $12 billion state bailout of the bank in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s.

The government has sought to divest four times before, but failed each time.

Meanwhile, the state-run Korea Development Bank has restarted the sale of its consumer finance unit after an auction fell through late last year due to lack of interest from potential buyers.

The KDB, which controls 99.92 percent of the unlisted KDB Capital, said in a statement Friday it would sell the stake through a public auction.

“The deadline for preliminary offers is March 24,” it said.

The book price of the shares up for grabs is almost 600 billion won ($482 million), while deal watchers say offers, if any, could come in at around 400 billion won. 


By Lee Sun-young (milaya@heraldcorp.com)