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Viewing cable 06CAIRO835, BANKING SECTOR UPDATE: U.S. INVESTMENT FIRM

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Reference ID Created Released Classification Origin
06CAIRO835 2006-02-12 14:03 2011-08-24 16:30 UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY Embassy Cairo
This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.
UNCLAS CAIRO 000835 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
STATE FOR NEA/ELA, NEA/RA AND EB/IDF 
USAID FOR ANE/MEA MCCLOUD AND CHAN 
USTR FOR SAUMS 
TREASURY FOR MILLS/NUGENT/WALKER/KLINGENSMITH 
COMMERCE FOR 4520/ITA/ANESA/TALAAT 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ECON EFIN EAID EG
SUBJECT: BANKING SECTOR UPDATE:  U.S. INVESTMENT FIRM 
PURCHASES SHARES IN COMMERCIAL INTERNATIONAL BANK 
 
REF: CAIRO 680 
 
This cable is Sensitive but Unclassified.  Please protect 
accordingly. 
 
1.  (U) Ripplewood Holdings, a New York based investment 
company, recently led a group of investment firms in the 
purchase of all of the public shares in Commercial 
International Bank (CIB), the largest joint venture (JV) bank 
in Egypt.  The Ripplewood-led consortium purchased 18.7% of 
CIB, which constitutes all of the shares of CIB held by the 
National Bank of Egypt (NBE), Egypt's largest public bank. 
Ripplewood is the first American firm to enter Egypt's 
banking sector, and the move is likely to spark interest from 
other U.S. investors, given Ripplewood's reputation for 
sniffing out good investment opportunities overseas.  The 
firm is famous for its purchase of a troubled public bank in 
Japan, which it turned around and sold for a profit five 
years later.  It was the first foreign private sector firm to 
purchase a Japanese bank. 
 
2.  (U) Ripplewood reps told Econoff that the firm was 
impressed with CIB's management and with the financial sector 
reforms the GOE has recently undertaken.  Though the 
consortium does not own a controlling share in CIB, it will 
work with the bank's management to make CIB "Egypt's national 
champion" and the standard for all other banks in the 
Egyptian market.  At a press conference after announcement of 
the sale, Hisham Ezz El Arab, Chairman of CIB, stated that 
CIB plans to expand its commercial operations not only in 
Egypt, but throughout the region.  The consortium has taken 
over NBE's seats on CIB's board of directors and has already 
appointed a number of prominent figures to fill the seats. 
Former Federal Reserve Director Paul Volcker has also been 
named by the consortium as an advisor to the board. 
 
3.  (U) Public reaction to the sale was mixed.  Press reports 
indicated grumbling in the market over the price per share of 
the purchase.  The consortium will pay LE 53.50 per share, 
for a total sale value of $230 million.  CIB's shares have 
been trading in the last few days at approximately LE 73.50 
on the Cairo and Alexandria Stock Exchange.  Ripplewood reps 
explained the discrepancy between their purchase price per 
share and the price per share on the stock exchange by noting 
that sale negotiations had been underway for several months. 
CIB's shares were trading at LE 53.50 when agreement was 
reached over the price per share.  In the last few weeks, 
rumors of the agreement had reached certain sectors of the 
market, which drove CIB's shares up to their current levels. 
 
4.  (SBU) Comment:  This purchase fulfills one of the 
benchmarks of the U.S.-Egypt Financial Sector MOU.  With the 
divestment of public shares in CIB and the recent sale of 
Egyptian-American Bank (EAB) to Calyon (reftel), the GOE has 
now fulfilled Benchmark 3.2 in the MOU, divestment of all GOE 
shares in the four largest JV banks.  CIB was the largest of 
the JV banks, followed by EAB, National Societe Generale Bank 
and Misr International Bank.  The latter two banks' public 
shares were divested in February and September 2005 
respectively.  Disbursement of Development Support Program 
(DSP) funds tied to completion of Benchmark 3.2 ($100 
million) is contingent upon completion of both Benchmark 3.1 
and 3.2.  Benchmark 3.1, completion of an audit of the four 
largest state-owned banks by an internationally recognized 
impartial institution, is still pending. 
 
5.  (SBU) Comment continued:  In an interesting turn of 
events, the head of one of the consortium members told 
Econoff that the consortium has already begun advising CIB on 
a bid to purchase the Bank of Alexandria (BOA), the public 
bank scheduled for privatization by March 2006.  The sale of 
BOA, either to CIB or another investor, will fulfill 
Benchmark 3.3 of the MOU, clearing the way for disbursement 
of $150 million in DSP funds tied to completion of Benchmark 
3.3.  An assessment of the GOE's compliance with other MOU 
benchmarks will be provided septel.  End comment. 
RICCIARDONE