Al Salam Bank-Bahrain (ASBB) has succeeded in securing acceptances from 90.4 per cent of Baharain Saudi Bank (BSB) shareholders for the bank's takeover, a senior bank official said on Tuesday.

The share holders possess 451,789,210 shares representing 90.4 per cent of the issued and paid up ordinary share capital of BSB, a senior official said.

ASBB chief executive officer Yousif Taqi said the level of acceptance as of July 7, 2009 is a clear indication of the high degree of trust and confidence of BSB shareholders in ASBB. The news comes ahead of July 12 bid deadline set by ASBB.

“This acquisition complements the business model of ASBB and fits with its intention to expand its retail and commercial banking presence in Bahrain. ASBB plans to maintain BSB’s corporate legal status by expanding and consolidating the Al Salam Group’s retail and commercial banking operations into BSB,' he added.

Following the acquisition, the Group will have eight retail branches and 16 Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) across th kingdom.

'This, coupled with Al Salam’s online banking and Shari’a compliant product suite, will enable the Al Salam Group to enhance visibility and expand its product and service delivery capabilities,' stated Taqi.

Since ASBB is an Islamic bank, it plans to convene an extraordinary general assembly meeting of BSB shareholders to seek their approval to convert the business operations of BSB into Islamically-compliant operations.

Subject to obtaining regulatory approvals, the retail commercial operations of the Al Salam Group will be carried out through BSB with the latter becoming the Bahrain-based retail & commercial banking arm of ASBB, he added.

Following the offer closing date, ASBB will start issuing allotment letters for the new shares to BSB shareholders who accepted and submitted their requests for share transfer.-TradeArabia News Service