Swiss international financial institution ICB Financial Group Holdings AG has been selected to buy 50.1 percent of Bangladesh's troubled Oriental Bank Ltd after it made the highest bid of 3.50 billion taka ($51 million), a central bank official said.
"They will have to deposit the offered money to Bangladesh Bank before signing of the sale-purchase agreement on February 28," Murshid said. ICB Group said it wanted to rename the bank International Commerce Bank and run it with former auditor general of Malaysia as the chairman, he added.
The accumulated loss of the bank was 4.50 billion taka as of March 2006, with bad loans of 4.37 billion taka, officials said. London-listed ICB Financial Group is a holding company for several banks operating in Eastern Europe, Africa and Indonesia.