National Citizen Bank plans to sell 203 mln Bamboo Airways shares

Private Vietnamese creditor National Citizen Bank (NCB) plans to sell 203 million shares in carrier Bamboo Airways, equivalent to nearly an 11% stake.

According to its newly-released resolution, NCB will seek shareholders' opinions in May regarding the sale.

NCB plans to conduct the transaction for a price equal to principal and interest on a loan equal to 203 million Bamboo Airways shares, plus interest incurred while waiting for payment.

Of these 203 million shares, some were used by FLC Group as collateral for Bamboo Airways to borrow from NCB. In addition to NCB, FLC and former chairman Trinh Van Quyet also used shares in Bamboo Airways as collateral for loans at OCB and Sacombank.

Bamboo Airways currently has a charter capital of VND18.5 trillion ($788.9 million), equivalent to 1.85 billion shares.

At a Bamboo Airways extraordinary shareholder meeting on April 10, Bamboo Airways' plan to increase its charter capital was denied by a 56.42% majority.

The firm presented plans to issue 996.2 million shares in 2023 in order to raise nearly VND10 trillion ($425.55 million) and increase its charter capital to nearly VND28.07 trillion ($1.2 billion). The carrier's shares are coded BAV.

Bamboo Airways' management also proposed a plan to issue 772 million shares to swap debts into shares according to an agreement between creditors and the company. The issue price and expected swap rate were VND10,000 ($0.43) per share, equivalent to a ratio of 1:1.

The total value of swapped debts including interest and principal amounts was valued until April 10, 2023. The list of creditors and debts up for exchange will be decided by Bamboo Airways' board of directors. Besides, Bamboo Airways also plans to issue 185 million shares to new investors, with an expected unit price of VND10,000.

The list of investors participating in the purchase of individual shares and the number of shares offered to each investor will be selected and approved by the board of directors. All additional shares will not be subject to transfer restrictions and prioritized for sale to existing shareholders based on the ratios of their current ownership.