Lebanon is still holding talks with its staff before deciding on which Lebanese bank will acquire its retail operations in the country, the chairman of BLOM Bank said Friday. “To our knowledge HSBC Lebanon is still holding talks with its staff before making a decision on who will acquire the operation of the bank,” Saad Azhari told The Daily Star.
Azhari refused to acknowledge reports that BLOM has a better chance to buy the retail operations of HSBC.
“It’s still not clear who will control the retail operations of the bank. We are one of the three or four banks bidding for the bank,” he added.
Apart from BLOM, Bank Audi and Byblos Bank are among the lenders who approached HSBC to buy its retail business in Lebanon.
But a well-connected source told the paper that BLOM appears to have a better chance to acquire HSBC in Lebanon.
Azhari said HSBC’s negotiations with its staff are mainly focused on the compensation employees will get if the acquisition goes through.
HSBC has nearly 200 managers and staff in Lebanon.
Bankers estimate that the value of the acquisition of HSBC Lebanon will range between $90 million to $100 million.
“HSBC was supposed to wrap up the talks with Lebanese banks at the end of March. But the negotiations with the staff apparently has delayed the decision,” Azhari explained.
He stressed that no banks will acquire HSBC Lebanon if the management still have differences with its staff.
HSBC has a headquarters in Mina al-Hosn and two branches in Hamra and Dora.
HSBC will keep a representative office in Lebanon even if its retail operations are sold.
In 2014, HSBC recorded a net profit of $18.35 million, an increase of 14 percent compared to 2014.
Total assets reached $1.05 billion at the end of 2014, constituting a decrease of 2.9 percent from a year earlier. Loans and advances to customers, excluding those to related parties, grew by 1.7 percent from end-2013 to $596.6 million.
Customer deposits, excluding those from related parties, totaled $846.1 million at end-2014 and declined by 5.5 percent from the end of 2013.
The loans-to-deposits ratio was 70.6 percent at end-2014 relative to 65.6 percent a year earlier. The bank’s shareholders’ equity grew by 7.7 percent from end-2013 to $66.5 million at the end of 2014.
