German mortgage bank Aareal to repay last of state aid - sources
FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Property lender Aareal Bank has agreed on the terms of the repayment of a final tranche of state aid to German bank bailout fund Soffin, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
In the financial crisis, the government injected 525 million euros ($703 million) in non-voting capital into the bank and granted guarantees of 4 billion euros to shield it from potential market turbulence.
Last month, Aareal said that it has applied to German regulator Bafin to repay a remaining 300 million euros in non-voting capital, which carries an annual coupon of 11.5 percent, as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, an agreement has been reached on the timetable of the repayment and a one-off compensation that Aareal is offering for repaying the final tranche, the sources said.
A final stamp from Bafin is still needed before Aareal can completely free itself from the state, they added.
Aareal, Bafin and Soffin declined to comment on the specific terms of the repayment.
The state aid bolstered Aareal's capital buffers - which banks need to hold to weather a potential crisis - by 1.8 percentage points as of the end of the first quarter 2014. But even without it, Aareal's so called core tier 1 capital ratio stood at 11.9 percent.
The lender, which is scheduled to post second quarter earnings on Tuesday, therefore sees itself well positioned to pass a set of European bank health checks this year.
(Reporting by Kathrin Jones and Alexander Hübner; writing by Arno Schuetze; Editing by Kirsti Knolle)
