Billionaire investor Aristotelis (Telis) Mistakidis has clinched a deal to become the biggest shareholder of small but expanding Greek shipping lender Aegean Baltic Bank (ABBank).
According to a report in the Greek newspaper Kathimerini, Glencore’s former top copper trader agreed on Friday to buy a 48% stake in the bank from the founding Afthonidis family, Greek shipowner John Coustas and other minority shareholders.
Managers with the Afthonidis and Coustas camps confirmed the information. The Afthonidis clan currently owns 42% of ABBank and Coustas 24%.
The deal values the entire bank at about €160m ($173m).
Completion of the transaction is still subject to regulatory approval, which is expected to take several months.
Following regulatory clearances, Mistakidis stands to ultimately assume majority control of the bank after a share capital increase, the biggest part of which he is expected to bankroll.
The Tsakos family, which holds a 24% stake in the firm, is not selling its interest.
TradeWinds reported last month that Mistakidis was inching towards clinching the deal.
The Afthonidis family will continue running the lender and remain its second-largest shareholder.
A source close to ABBank told TradeWinds last month that “nothing in the bank’s management or character would change” following the takeover.
Mistakidis has already publicly expressed his positive view of the founding family and its management of the bank.
‘Perfect time’
The niche lender closed 2023 with net income rising to €27.2m, on €506m worth of gross loans, according to unaudited results.
With non-performing loans below 1% of the total loan book and a capital adequacy ratio at 24% — about twice that of the average Greek bank — ABBank management told TradeWinds earlier this year that it was ready to engage in new types of financing, such as newbuildings.
ABBank would be one of several investments Mistakidis has made in the country where he was born.
In his Kathimerini interview last year, he said this was the “perfect time” to invest in Greece as it emerges from its debt crisis.
