Bank of Queensland Ltd (ASX:BOQ) announced on Monday that it has inked an agreement to acquire 100% of Members Equity Bank Limited (ME Bank) for cash consideration of AU$1.325 billion.
The acquisition shall be funded through an underwritten capital raising of AU$1.35 billion.
Jointly, the Group will have pro forma total assets over $88 billion, with total deposits of more than $56 billion.
It should be noted that both the firms are highly complementary and share a similar customer-centric culture along with similar purpose and values.
Patrick Allaway, Chairman said that this is a significant step in BOQ’s approach to be the top customer-centric option to the big banks. With the addition of the ME Bank business, BOQ has material scale and a persuasive development platform to sustain this determination.
Managing Director and CEO George Frazis said that this will benefit the shareholders, customers and people. The acquisition broadly doubles the Retail bank and provides geographic diversification. He also said that the ME Bank also gels well with the Virgin Money brands, thereby creating customer-centric alternatives in Australia.
Meanwhile, the BOQ stock was quoted at $8.410 per share with market capitalisation at $3.83 billion.
