Alpha Bank has rejected the "friendly" takeover bid by rival National Bank of Greece (NBG), the biggest Greek bank, but the matter is not considered closed, with talks continuing in the banking circles of Athens.
The state has a crucial role in acting as a catalyst towards a prospective deal, being a major shareholder of NBG, with one representative in the Board, as well as holding preferential shares in Alpha, which was injected with liquidity amid the crisis that devastated Greece in the last year. NBG's bid dates from January 18th and Alpha, the third-largest bank in Greece, admitted it has held exploratory talks. The Board has a big say at Alpha, holding around 10% of the shares, while the remaining shareholders are heterogeneous: 47% is held by individuals, 34% by foreign institutional investors, 10% by Greek institutional investors. Alpha would need to consolidate its capital, but traditionally egos are very big in the Greek banking industry. If the transaction does goes ahead after all, a bank with 200 billion euros in assets will result, which would rank among the 30 biggest banks in Europe. In Romania, the merger would create the third-largest local bank, with an 8,5% market share, but still far behind the second leading player, BRD.
Alpha Bank has rejected the "friendly" takeover bid by rival National Bank of Greece (NBG), the biggest Greek bank, but the matter is not considered closed, with talks continuing in the banking circles of Athens.
The state has a crucial role in acting as a catalyst towards a prospective deal, being a major shareholder of NBG, with one representative in the Board, as well as holding preferential shares in Alpha, which was injected with liquidity amid the crisis that devastated Greece in the last year. NBG's bid dates from January 18th and Alpha, the third-largest bank in Greece, admitted it h
