Plain Spain

2 October 2007 By Pierre Briancon

The Barcelona savings bank hopes to raise up to E4bn by listing Criteria, its investment vehicle. The money is earmarked for financial services acquisitions abroad not hitherto an area of expertise. Shareholders will become minority investors in a minority investor. At least, they are being offered a discount to NAV.

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Spanish savings bank La Caixa next week will list 20% of Criteria, its investment vehicle, in the first major European IPO after this summer's credit crunch. The bank hopes to raise up to E4bn, which it said it will spend on acquisitions in financial services, most notably in Eastern Europe. Criteria has about E25bn of assets and would become the seventh biggest stock in Spain's Ibex. It holds 36% of gas distributor Gas Natural, 12.5% of oil giant Repsol, 5.5% of telecom operator Telefonica, 21% of tollroad operator Abertis and 49% of water company Agbar. Those five stakes account for 80% of its portfolio.
Criteria said that, over time, it intends to balance the portfolio equally between industrial and financial holdings.
The share price range has been tentatively put at E5E6.75. 55% of the shares will be sold to indvidual investors, 5% to the company's staff, and 40% to institutional investors three quarter of them foreign. The price will be set October 8 with the listing to start on October 10.

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