The Commonwealth Bank of Australia, which goes by the acronym CBA, has sold 5 percent of its holding in Vietnam International Bank which goes by the acronym VIB, according to a press release. The stake was sold for A$160 million or US$109.7 million.
This comes after it was announced back in June that the Australian bank would be divesting from the company which VIB’s board of directors reportedly only learned about after the State Bank of Vietnam approved the move. The Commonwealth Bank held a 20 percent stake in the bank at the time.
VIB subsequently responded by announcing that it would be lowering its foreign ownership limit from 20.5 percent to 4.99 percent. This essentially means that the CBA can only offload its shares to Vietnamese buyers. It’s not clear what the thinking is behind this.
Of note, the overarching foreign ownership in banks is limited to 30 percent. Below this, foreign ownership limits are applied at the bank level which be raised or lowered at will as long as they don’t exceed said 30 percent.