BANKING - Qatar Islamic Bank eyeing up Bank Asya

The new, but lucrative participation banking sector in Turkey is attracting the covetous glances of foreign Islamic banks, at a time when the Arab world is in turmoil. Local news source, Haberturk, raised the specter that foreign buyers were looking to secure a stake in Asya Katilim Bankasi, Turkey’s largest participation bank. Because of Turkey’s secularist constitution, Islamic banks are referred to as participation banks. The report claimed that HSBC had been mandated to sell 25% of Bank Asya to Qatar Islamic Bank – this was swiftly denied by Bank Asya, but neither confirmed nor denied by QIB. (full story)



A few days later QIB’s acting CEO, Ahmad Meshari told Bloomberg that the lender wants to “enter the Turkish market.” However, he declined to comment on whether Bank Asya was a target.
Inquiries from The Islamic Globe to two of QIB’s top executives remained unanswered at the time of going to press, while Bank Asya refuted the story again.

A spokesperson from the bank told The Islamic Globe: “There is no decision taken about the sale of our bank’s shares.No investment company has been appointed. There is no special situation regarding our bank that has not been disclosed to the public.”

However, investors apparently took the report seriously. Bank Asya shares rose 2.8% to TRY2.96 on March 10. Since then they have declined, closing at TRY2.87 on Tuesday.

Over half, 52.54% of Bank Asya is publicly-traded on the local stock market, but the bank also has multiple JV partners. Its most influential includes Turkish companies Ortadoğu (4.22%), Forum Insaat (2.51%) and Birim Birlesik (2.4%). Turkish businessmen Osman Can Pehlivan and Abdulkadir Konukoglu have 3.23% and 2.23% stakes, respectively.

Turkey, Kazakhstan and France are the three countries that QIB says it might invest in this year. The financial behemoth had previously attempted to acquire Turkiye Finans, another Turkish Islamic lender, but lost the competition to Saudi Arabia’s National Commercial Bank. The Saudi lender currently owns nearly 65% of the Turkish bank.

Turkey’s banking sector is attracting huge attention from foreign companies, and one of the key reasons is that the iron-fisted Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency (BRSA) is reluctant to give licenses to new players. Indeed, the regulator’s last license was given in 2004. Thus, investors generally find it easier to acquire stakes in existing lenders.

Bank Asya has reported a net income of TRY260m ($164m) for 2010, a considerable drop compared to 2009’s TRY301.3m ($190.2m). Its deposit growth retreated from 56% to 22% in the same period, while asset size growth fell from 43% to 25%. Loan expansion was stagnant at 36%.

Partly due to these not-so-stellar results, general manager Cemil Ozdemir announced his resignation on March 12, leaving the seat to Abdullah Celik.

Source : http://www.theislamicglobe.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=131:qatar-islamic-bank-eyeing-up-bank-asya&catid=8:artcile&Itemid=40 - April 16, 2011