Business News

• Govt to raise stake in Union Bank to 58%.
• SBI to offer special rates to some sectors
• Apicrop sells stake in ACBC to Aditya Birla

Govt to raise stake in Union Bank to 58%.

State owned Union Bank of India on Wednesday said it is expecting `1,150 crore capital infusion from the government by March , which will increase the Centre's stake to 58%.

Currently, the government holds 55.43% in the bank.

“We hope to get the second tranche of `1,150 crore capital infusion by March.
This will help us to increase our tier I capital to 8.37% from the current 7.9%”, Union Bank chairman and managing director M.V. Nair said.

Meanwhile, the bank said it is planning to raise $200 million (about `900 crore) from the overseas market in the next two months through a bond issue.

SBI to offer special rates to some sectors

The country's largest lender, State Bank of India (SBI), on Wednesday said it will offer confessional rates to borrowers for setting up dairy, poultry and horticultural units as well as for construction of warehouses and cold storages. Confessional rates will be offered on new loans sanctioned till 31 March.

Term loans and working capital loans under this scheme will vary between 10% and 10.5%, SBI said.

The prevailing rates in such loans, according to SBI, is between 12.10% and 14.85%.

Apicrop sells stake in ACBC to Aditya Birla

Arab Petroleum Investment Corp. (Apicorp) will sell its 12% stake in Egypt based Alexandria Carbon Black Co. (ACBC) SAE to Aditya Birla Group, the majority shareholder in the company.

By doing so, Apicorp--the multilateral development bank of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (Oapec)--has kicked off a divestment plan aimed at mobilizing funds for a new phase of investments, the firm said in a statement.

Santrupt B. Misra, the chief executive of Aditya Birla Group's carbon black business, said: “Apicorp has played an important role in the growth of ACBC since investing in the company 17 years ago. We are sad that it will no longer be part of ACBC's investment family, but we are pleased that we will continue our partnership with Apicorp in Alexandria Fiber Co. (AFCO), in which we are both equity partners.“