Malaysian firm is sole bidder for Islamic Bank, offers P459 million

Interglobal Consulting Ltd. (ICL), a Malaysian firm, emerged as the lone bidder for the government’s stake in Al-Amanah Islamic Investment Bank of the Philippines (Islamic Bank) following its formal offering yesterday at the Makati Shangri-La Hotel in Makati City.

ICL submitted a bid of P5 million, or P100 per share, for the 50,000 common "A" shares held by the Privatization and Management Office (PMO) and P454 million for the 4,542,879 unissued common "A" shares.

Based on PMO’s calculations ICL’s bid for more than 4.5 million common "A" shares and the PMO-held shares would entitle the Malaysian firm to a 95-percent control of the Islamic Bank.

ICL did not bid for the 4,000,000 unissued common "C" shares of the bank.

"The "C" shares would have no impact on the control of the bank because they are still unissued shares," F. Victor C. Bacungan, department manager of the PMO, said.

PMO head Renato Valdecantos said the bid of ICL "was within the expectation of the privatization body."

"The bid of ICL would still have to be approved by the Privatization Council and the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas," Valdecantos added.

Aside from its bid, Valdecantos said, the Malaysian consortium still has to make an infusion into the bank to meet the capitalization requirement for a commercial bank.

ICL director Mohammad Taib Ali expressed confidence in the Philippine banking industry. "We see a future in the local banking industry," he said.