MADRID--Catalunya Banc SA, a nationalized Spanish lender, said
Friday it had sold its real-estate servicing unit to Blackstone
Group LP.
The bank said in a regulatory filing that Blackstone had agreed
to pay "a maximum of EUR40 million" ($55.6 million), leaving the
exact price dependent on whether certain conditions are met. It
didn't detail the conditions.
Catalunya Banc failed in an earlier attempt to sell the unit,
CatalunyaCaixa Inmobiliaria. The sale is one step in a broader
strategy by the Spanish government to return the nationalized bank
to private hands.
Spain has spent EUR12 billion to clean up Catalunya Banc, making
the Barcelona-based lender Spain's second most-expensive bank
bailout. The lender's bank-branches carry the name
CatalunyaCaixa.
The Spanish government received EUR41 billion in bailout funds
from the European Union in 2012 as rising loan defaults threatened
to bankrupt some of its lenders.
The sale of CatalunyaCaixa Inmobiliaria is a step toward
reducing the size of Catalunya Banc before the bank itself goes up
for sale later this year.
The lender has hired advisers to help sell its branches outside
its home region of Catalonia. After that will come the sale of its
core business in Catalonia. Also on the docket is a EUR7 billion
portfolio of risky mortgage loans.
Spain's bank restructuring fund, known by its Spanish acronym
Frob, has failed twice to sell Catalunya Banc. The stakes in the
new attempt are high for the Spanish government, which wants to
show voters and investors that it is efficiently moving beyond the
country's banking crisis.
Spain has made progress privatizing its other bailed-out
lenders.
In February it sold a 7.5% stake in Bankia, chipping away at its
majority stake in the biggest bailed-out lender. The government
still owns 60% of Bankia after spending EUR22.4 billion in bailout
money to stanch its losses. Bankia was created from the merger of
seven regional savings banks, the financial institutions that
helped finance a real-estate boom that went bust six years ago.
In December, a Venezuelan bank bought NCG Banco SA, which had
received EUR9 billion in bailout funds.
Blackstone's purchase of Catalunya Banc's real-estate servicer
follows similar acquisitions by other international investors in
Spain.
Banco Santander SA, Spain's largest bank, sold its real-estate
servicing unit to Apollo Global Management LLC in January. Most
other major Spanish banks have sold theirs in recent months.
Real-estate servicing units, such as the one being sold by
Catalunya Banc, market and sell properties owned by the bank, such
as homes that have been foreclosed.
Catalunya Banc said in the regulatory filing that it had sold or
rented 6,000 properties in 2013.
Write to Jeannette Neumann at jeannette.neumann@wsj.com
Subscribe to WSJ: http://online.wsj.com?mod=djnwires