Shlomo Eliahu fails to sell Leumi stock
Foreign banks bid considerably lower than market value, Eliahu Holdings decides to call off sale of Bank Leumi shares he put up for grabs Tuesday
The tender, led by Shlomo Eliahu's son and General Manager of Eliahu Holdings Israel Eliahu, was held Tuesday night with results coming in at 10:30 pm. The Eliahu family decided not to accept any of the bids for the share bundle that represents half of Eliahu's holdings in the bank – a 5% stake of Leumi.
Eliahu is currently close to closing a deal for the acquisition of the controlling stake (69%) of Migdal insurance group from Generali Group for NIS 3.5 billion ($920 million), a price tag which is NIS 600 million ($157 million) lower than the original asking price after the Italian insurance group slashed the price by 13%.
The Eliahu family stressed that the sale was designed to facilitate the acquisition of the controlling stake of Migdal and for that reason alone.
The family also stressed that the decision to sell came after it had received offers to sell the stock in the wake of the market recovery in recent weeks sharply boosting the stock's value.
Aside from the private capital Eliahu will commit for the completion of the Migdal deal, he will also finance the deal through loans, having secured NIS 2 billion ($520 million) in credit from Bank Leumi against personal guarantees and NIS 350 million ($92 million) in credit from Bank Discount.
He will also pledge a portion of his Migdal shares and put up private assets as collateral as well.
This report was originally published in Hebrew by Calcalist
