Egypt's Pioneer buys Beltone

Egypt's financial services firm Pioneers Holding inked in principle its all-share deal to acquire Egyptian investment bank Beltone Financial.

"The initial agreement between Pioneers and Beltone says the former will acquire 100 per cent of the latter," Egyptian media said, adding Pioneers would issue 100 million new shares to buy Beltone.

The deal would be worth E£700 million (Dh470m), the paper said, giving no details of its sources. Officials from Pioneers and Beltone were not immediately available for comment. The two companies have been in talks since November regarding the acquisition.

The media quoted Pioneers Holding board member Khaled El Tayeb as saying that restructuring of the Pioneers board would take place once the acquisition is completed to include representatives from both Beltone and Pioneers.

Pioneers specialises in brokerage services and also offers market research and investment banking for retail and institutional clients.

Beltone oversees some $5 billion (Dh18.3) in assets and has offices in New York, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE. The firm said at the time of the merger announcement last year that Pioneers share issue was expected to take place in six to eight weeks.

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