American International Group is offering for sale about $1.2 billion worth of shares in China's PICC Property and Casualty Co Ltd (PICC P&C) in a block deal, IFR said on Saturday, citing a term sheet of the deal. AIG's stake sale is among the biggest block deals in Asia this year and comes at a time when several European and US financial institutions have been trimming their exposure to Chinese banks and insurers.
Citigroup and Deutsche Bank both have sold their minority holdings in Chinese banks in recent months. AIG is offering 740 million PICC P&C shares in an indicative price range of HK$13.06-HK$13.35 ($1.68-$1.72) each, an up to 8 percent discount to PICC's Friday close, the term sheet showed. After the latest sale, AIG will be left with some 110 million shares in PICC, according to Thomson Reuters data. AIG has agreed to a 60-day lock-up on those shares, the term sheet showed. The US insurer has been cutting exposure to PICC P&C, and last year it raised about $1.3 billion in two separate selldowns. AIG acquired a stake in PICC P&C as a cornerstone investor in 2003, ahead of the Chinese insurer's stock market flotation.
AIG traces its roots to 1919 when Cornelius Vander Starr established a general insurance business in Shanghai. Following the global financial crisis, AIG sold part of its Asian life insurance business AIA Group Ltd through a $20.1 billion Hong Kong IPO in 2010 to help repay a US government bail-out. Over a period of time, AIG fully exited from AIA. But in 2013, AIG invested about $500 million in the IPO of People Insurance Group of China Co Ltd, reaffirming its commitment to the Asia Pacific region. Prior to Saturday's selldown, AIG held 851 million PICC P&C shares, making it the biggest shareholder in PICC P&C. Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are the joint global coordinators for the deal, according to the term sheet. AIG did not respond to an email seeking comment.
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