Today on January 29, 2016, AS LHV Varahaldus - a subsidiary of AS LHV Group has entered into a share purchase agreement with Danske Bank A/S and Danske Bank A/S Eesti filiaal pursuant to which Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus is to purchase 100% of the shares of Danske Capital AS. The finalization of the transaction is subject to the approval of the Estonian Financial Supervision Authority (Finantsinspektsioon) and the Estonian Competition Authority (Konkurentsiamet).
The transaction is presumably finalized during the first half-year, provided that all the conditions precedent to the finalization have been fulfilled. The transaction price shall be determined upon the finalization and AS LHV Group shall announce it thereafter. In order to finance the transaction, AS LHV Group is prior to the transaction going to increase the share capital of Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus and purchase subordinated bonds of Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus.
The aim of the transaction is to expand the business activities of Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus and thereby offer the mandatory pension fund clients the best long-term investment service. After the finalization of the transaction, the mandatory pension fund market share of Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus shall be approximately 30%.
Danske Capital AS manages three mandatory pension funds and two voluntary pension funds. The assets under management of Danske Capital AS is currently 235,8 million euros and there are over 43 thousand active clients in the Danske mandatory pension funds.
Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus, a fund management company which belongs to LHV group, manages five mandatory pension funds, one voluntary pension fund and one UCITS fund. LHV pension funds have about 130 thousand active clients. “I hope that the clients of both management companies may be content with today’s undertaking as strong management companies are united which follow the same investment principles and prioritize the preservation of the clients’ assets also in difficult market conditions,” said Mihkel Oja, chairman of the management board of Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus.
After finalization of the transaction the plan is to merge Danske Capital AS with Aktsiaselts LHV Varahaldus. As the following step, the plan is to merge pension funds with similar investments strategies. The receiving funds shall be LHV pension funds and the merging funds shall be the funds managed by Danske Capital AS.
The transaction is not considered to be a transaction with related parties in the meaning of the rules and regulations of Nasdaq Tallinn stock exchange and it does not have a direct effect on the economic activities of AS LHV Group. The management board and the supervisory board members of AS LHV Group are not personally interested in the transaction in any other way.
Priit Rum
Communication Manager
GSM: +372 502 0786
E-mail: priit.rum@lhv.ee
Julia Garanža
Communications and Marketing Manager
AS LHV Varahaldus
GSM: +372 5668 1622
E-mail: julia.garanza@lhv.ee