Athens: Greece's Eurobank stated on Tuesday that a 2.86-billion-euro share capital increase mandated by the central bank had ended with strong demand from private investors. "Both the public offering and the international offering were oversubscribed," stated the bank. "Over 250 institutional investors participated in the international offering, confirming the strong interest in Eurobank"
"We are impressed by the high level of quality and demand as well as the participation of long-only funds, sovereign wealth funds and the cornerstone investors," said Anastasia Sakellariou, CEO, Hellenic stability fund. Eurobank's new shares will begin trading on May 9.
Greek lenders have been shoring up their balance sheets following a recent recommendation by the central bank. Greece's top lender National Bank plans a capital increase of up to 2.5 billion euros ($3.5 billion). Two other top banks - Piraeus and Alpha have respectively raised 1.75 billion and 1.2 billion euros.
The Bank of Greece had said the four main Greek lenders - National Bank, Piraeus, Alpha and Eurobank, needed nearly 6.4 billion euros in additional capital. The banks had been recapitalised last year as part of the Greek EU-IMF bailout. A sum of 50 billion euros from Greece's EU-IMF rescue loans was earmarked for their recapitalisation after heavy losses suffered by Greek banks which wrote down privately held Greek government bonds in 2012.
