SEOUL, 30 Dec. (Yonhap) — Kakao Bank, South Korea’s leading internet lender, said Wednesday that it recently completed a 1 trillion won ($920 million) capital raise to improve its absorptive capacity. losses and provide more loans for low and medium credit borrowers.
TPG Capital of the United States and Anchor Equity Partners of Hong Kong recently bought shares worth 250 billion won, or a 2.61% stake, respectively, the lender said.
Another 500 billion won of shares were sold to existing shareholders, including Kakao Corp., the operator of South Korea’s dominant messaging app, KakaoTalk.
After the rights offering, Kakao is the largest shareholder of Kakao Bank with a 31.78% stake, followed by Korea Investment Value Asset Management Co. with 27.1% and KB Kookmin Bank with 9.35%. Chinese IT giant Tencent also has a 3.74% stake.
Kakao Bank said its capital adequacy ratio, a key barometer of financial strength measuring the proportion of a bank’s capital to its risk-weighted assets, would reach around 20%.
After the rights issue is completed, Kakao Bank’s outstanding shares stand at 407.65 million, with paid-up capital reaching some 2.8 trillion won.
In 2017, South Korea allowed two internet-only banks – Kakao Bank and K-Bank – to offer round-the-clock services in a bid to inject more competition into the banking industry.
