Slovenia-based lender Nova Ljubljanska Banka (NLB) and Belgium-based insurance firm KBC Insurance NV are looking to offload their life insurance venture NLB Vita.
NLB Vita, member of the NLB Group, was the second largest life insurance firm in the Slovene market with a market share of 14.8% at the end of 2018.
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The sale of NLB Vita, which is an equal stake joint venture of Ljubljana and KBC Insurance, could fetch up to €60m ($66.57m), according to Reuters.
Last year, the European Commission (EC) imposed a condition to offload NLB Vita to approve partial privatisation of state-backed NLB.
In 2013, Slovenia committed to divest 75% of NLB by the end of 2018 in lieu of the EC’s nod to the capital infusion in the bank by the government.
The government of Slovenia sold a 65% stake in 2018 and again offloaded 10%, which helped in the completion of the privatisation of the bank in June this year.
NLB in a statement said: “Both NLB and KBC believe that the NLB Vita is an interesting investment, as its business results and efficient sales have already proven the success of the banking-insurance model on the Slovene market.
“NLB will continue to collaborate with Vita also in the future, by selling its products. Regardless who owns NLB Vita, the sales network for the products will continue to be NLB’s distribution network (with 93 branches and internet sale).”
NLB stated that only those banking representatives, who hold a licence to sell insurance products, will sell NLB Vita offerings. NLB Vita portfolio consists of 25 different individual and group insurance coverage.
