On April 14, 2010, head of METROPOL Group M.V. Slipenchuk announced that final agreements have been reached to sell 50% of Obibank stock to the Japanese SBI Holdings. The deal will be done on market terms.
”It is the first time that Japanese investors join the equity of a Russian bank on parity terms,” Slipenchuk said.
Obibank’s main interest in the cooperation framework is to get access to technologies and services that will ensure the access of Japanese investors to the Russian market, while SBI Holdings is interested in expanding the business.
The deal will be executed in the framework of the Memorandum of Understanding signed on February 19, 2010 on joint Internet-banking development on the Russian market. According to the agreements, SBI Holdings will buy existing shares and later a decision will be adopted to increase the authorized capital of Obibank. The agreements provide a buyback option for the package of shares at a price that comprises the cost of the deal plus Central Bank of Russia refinancing rate for the buyback date.

Background

SBI Holdings is a leader of the Internet-banking market in Japan. In 2007 SBI Holdings jointly with Sumitomo Trust & Banking created the SBI Sumishin Net Bank with an authorized capital of 25 billion yen (280 million dollars). The bank is specific as it operates only in Internet and masters new technologies. As for December 2009 the number of client bank accounts comprised 637,000,  while deposits exceeded 10 billion dollars. In 2008 The Asian Banker named SBI Sumishin Net Bank “the Best Internet Bank for 2008”.

CB Obibank LLC is a universal commercial bank providing a full range of financial services, as well as complex support to major investment projects. The National Rating Agency assigned an individual A- credit rating to CB Obibank LLC (high reliability, third level). In 2009 CB Obibank LLC occupied the 184th place by the assets (9,697 million rubles), the 221st place by its own capital (1,250 million rubles), 142nd place by undistributed profit (114.3 million rubles) in the ranking of main indicators of Russian banks performance published by the Finmarket news agency of the Interfax Group.