IMM PE sells $135 mn Woori Financial shares in block deal

IMM Private Equity has sold 180.5 billion won ($135 million) worth of shares in South Korea’s Woori Financial Group in a block deal, reaping 42.3 billion won in capital gains, according to people with knowledge of the matter on Saturday.

The Seoul-based private equity firm unloaded the shares at 14,370 won per share, or 31% above its purchase price of 11,000 won in 2016.

The stock deal represents a 3.6% discount on Woori’s closing price of Feb. 29, the last trading day before the March 1 Liberation Day holiday. IMM PE had offered a discount of 3.0-5.0% on Woori shares.

The deal comes after Woori’s share price climbed to 15,200 won on Feb. 19, its highest point since May 2022 amid expectations of the so-called corporate value-up program led by the government to buoy the anemic domestic stock market.

Back in 2016, it became Woori’s third-largest shareholder after Woori’s employee share ownership association and the National Pension Service. It had purchased Woori shares through a blind pool fund and a project fund without borrowing.

After the block sale, IMM PE’s ownership of Woori Financial has decreased to 3.85% from 5.57%.

But it is still entitled to recommend an external board member like other institutional stakeholders: Kiwoom Securities Co., Korea Investment & Securities Co., Eugene Private Equity and Taiwan-based Fubon Financial Holding Co.

Goldman Sachs and UBS jointly managed the block sale.

Since the start of this year, private equity groups have capitalized on the advance in Korean banking groups’ share prices.

Last month, The Carlyle Group divested of its entire 1.2% stake in KB Financial Group, the country’s No. 1 financial services firm, at 326.0 billion won in block trade.

Seoul-based Affinity Equity Partners had cashed out a 2% stake in Shinhan Financial Group at around 450 billion won in two block deals between late January and early February of this year. It now holds a 1.8% stake in South Korea’s No. 2 banking group.

Write to Seok-Cheol Choi at dolsoi@hankyung.com
 

Yeonhee Kim edited this article.