Saudi lender NCB agrees to buy rival Samba for US$15b

[RIYADH] National Commercial Bank, Saudi Arabia's largest lender by assets, agreed to buy rival Samba Financial Group for US$15 billion in one of the biggest banking takeovers this year.

NCB agreed to pay 28.45 riyals (S$10.26) for each Samba share on Sunday, valuing it at about 55.7 billion riyals. NCB will offer 0.739 new shares for each Samba share, at the lower end of the 0.736-0.787 per share ratio agreed when the banks signed an initial framework agreement in June.

The offer price is a 3.5 per cent premium over Samba's Oct 8 closing price of 27.50 riyals and about 24 per cent higher than the price the shares traded at before the talks were made public in June. The combined bank will have total assets of more than US$220 billion and a market capitalisation of US$46 billion.

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