Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) announced on Thursday that it has agreed to sell its Indonesian banking unit, PT Bank Commonwealth (PTBC), to a subsidiary of Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation Limited (OCBC).
According to the announcement, OCBC Indonesia will acquire 99% of PTBC from CBA for an upfront cash consideration of approximately A$220 million (about $142 million), subject to completion adjustments.
PTBC has more than 1.2 million customers, with total assets of $1.2 billion and net assets of $252 million as of June 30, 2023. The bank focuses on retail and SME segments, providing banking and wealth management products.
CBA said it has been involved in the growth of PTBC since 1997.
“The sale of this shareholding is consistent with CBA’s strategy to focus on its banking business in Australia and New Zealand,” the Australian bank said.
CBA added that it will work with OCBC Indonesia over the coming months on the transition of ownership.
The completion of the deal is expected to occur in the second or third quarter of next year, subject to a number of conditions including regulatory approvals from the Indonesia Financial Services Authority and the Monetary Authority of Singapore.
The buyer, OCBC Indonesia, is the ninth-largest bank in the country by total assets. It has 199 offices in 54 cities and offers products and services to both individual and corporate clients in Indonesia.
OCBC Indonesia is listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange and has a market capitalisation of about $1.6 billion.
The sale comes about eight months after CBA announced that PTBC had been hit by a cyber incident involving unauthorised access to a web-based software application used for project management and that the bank’s Australian systems were segregated from PTBC systems.
In 2020, CBA sold its Indonesian life insurance unit, PT Commonwealth Life, to FWD Life Indonesia for about $300 million.
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