Bank of Cyprus bought 9.7% of the shares of "Banca Transilvania", according to a press release sent yesterday to the Bucharest Stock Exchange, after rumors that a European bank would become a shareholder of Banca Transilvania have been going around for a while.
Bank of Cyprus paid 58 million Euros for the 102,862,785 shares of TLV acquired, putting the bank"s capitalization at 580 million Euros.
Officials of Banca Transilvania were unavailable for comment yesterday.
Bank of Cyprus says it only acquired shares in TLV as an investment, with the transaction having no influence on its strategy for Romania. On September 30, Bank of Cyprus had 11 branches in Romania, with loans worth EUR 585 million and deposits worth EUR 113 million.
"Transilvania" is the largest Romanian bank owned by domestic shareholders, having assets worth EUR 4.3 billion, at the end of September.