Spanish lender looks for Turkey investment

ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News

A couple smiles next to a Banco Popular branch office in Seville, Spain. REUTERS photo

The Spain-based Banco Popular Espanol has decided to enter the Turkish market and will soon sign an agreement with The Turkish Prime Ministry’s Investment Support and Promotion Agency, Reuters quoted a company press release as having said.

The decision to enter Turke and the potential investment will be unveiled at a joint press meeting on Dec. 11, the company said, without elaborating further. Banco Popular’s finance’s are not sterile from the debt-ridden Spanish economy. It has carried out a 2.5 billion euro share and rights issue to avoid the need to seek state aid, a separate Reuters report said late last month. İlker Aycı, tphe president of Turkey’s investment agency and Angel Rivera Congosta, the general manager of the Spanish bank are scheduled to be present at the press meeting.

Separately, Turkey’s Sabah newspaper claimed yesterday that Italy’s Generali, the largest insurance company in the country, was interested in Yapı Kredi Sigorta, the insurance branch of Turkey’s Yapı Kredi Bank.

Acquisition talks would start soon and a final decision was awaited during the first half of next year, the paper claimed, without naming any particular source. Turkey’s Koç Holding will partner with another, Italian company, Unicredit, for the controlling stake in Yapı Kredi Bank, which has declared it will sell off its insurance branch.