The Arab Banking Corporation (ABC) or Bank ABC’s potential acquisition of BLOM Bank Egypt continues to make headlines as the Egyptian Exchange releases more data on the mandatory tender offer (MTO).

In a Monday statement, the Egyptian Stock Exchange (EGX) stated that the purchase offer price is LE 22.33 per share, with the execution and settlement currency is equivalent to $1.42 per share.

The MTO, submitted by Bank ABC, is for the former to purchase up to 300 million of BLOM Bank’s shares, representing up to 100% of the issued capital of BLOM Bank Egypt.

The deal is valued at $427 million, equivalent to EGP 6.7 billion.

The validity period of the offer is 10 working days, starting from the day following the date of the purchase offer’s publication, and will run until the end of trading on 5 August, the EGX wrote in its statement.

Implementation is to be done on the exchange within five working days from the end of the offer period, it added.

The EGX also pointed out that brokerage firms must register the buying and selling orders for this offer in the relevant system of the Stock Exchange (OPR) during the period, provided that all orders are open-ended (OPEN).

It must be taken into account not to make any amendments to the codes of the seller's clients lead to their being stopped until the transaction is completed.

The exchange also stressed that all brokerage firms should review their orders through the system’s follow-up screens before the end of the next August 5 trading session, provided that these companies make any amendments to their orders before the end of this date, and no amendments to the order data will be allowed after the end of this date.

Bank ABC recently stated that it had received approval to move forward with the acquisition from Egypt’s Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA) in a Bahrain Stock Exchange statement on Sunday.

HSBC Bank Middle East will act as the financial advisor to the ABC, while Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Zulfikar & Associates will act as legal advisors. CI Capital will act as financial advisor to BLOM Bank, whilst Baker & McKenzie will act as legal advisor.

The acquisition has been in the news since January, with several Egyptian news outlets suggesting that the acquisition would possibly be finalized in Q2 2021 at the time.

Bank ABC already has a presence in Egypt with Bank ABC Egypt, in which it owns a 93% stake.