Bank Muscat to sell entire holding in HDFC Bank

Bank Muscat today said it has sold 40 per cent of its stake in India's second largest private sector lender HDFC Bank and would offload the entire holding over a period of time.

At the current market level, the shares sold by Bank Muscat, which held 2.13 per cent in HDFC Bank as on December 31, 2008, would be worth about Rs 300 crore.

"Till date the bank has disposed around 40 per cent of its stake and the gain on realisations will be reported in our first quarter results," Bank Muscat said in a regulatory filing with Muscat Stock Exchange. Oman's biggest lender did not disclose financial details of the share sale.

"In line with our annual report disclosures in our chairman's statement, we decided to sell our stake in HDFC Bank, India over a period of time," Bank Muscat said further.

For the quarter ended December 2008, Bank Muscat held 90,51,724 equity shares of HDFC Bank and 40 per cent of shares held by the Oman bank would be worth around Rs 305 crore at yesterday's closing.

Shares of Bank Muscat were trading down by 7.20 per cent at 0.503 Omani Riyals after it said it is likely to post losses. "We could have RO 4 million to RO 7 million of losses in the first quarter results," Bank Muscat said in the filing.

Shares of HDFC Bank were trading lower by 1 per cent at Rs 836.60 on the Bombay Stock Exchange.