Bank Of Bahrain Moves Court Against Alpic Sec

The Bank of Bahrain and Kuwait, BSC. (BBK) has initiated legal proceedings against Alpic Securities Ltd in respect of a financial claim which has arisen against the latter regarding sale of shares in the erstwhile company, Alpic BBK Finance.

Ravi Kumar, managing director, Alpic Finance, however, said that, "At the time of merger of BBK Finance with Alpic Securities, the bank said that it wanted get out of the venture by selling its stake to Alpic. But we were not interested, resulting in both the parties going in for arbitration proceedings."

BBK held a 30 per cent stake in Alpic BBK Finance Ltd, formed in 1992 with a share capital of Rs 3 crore, the balance was held by the Alpic group. The Bombay High Court had passed the amalgamation order on August 23, 2001.

In the meantime, Alpic also expressed its intention of getting out of the broking business as early as possible. Kumar said, "We are also looking for suitable buyers to sell our stake and get out of the broking. In such a situation, we are not interested in buying others' stake."

In a related development, Alpic Finance is planning to demerge its distribution services arm Allanzers into a separate outfit Allanzers Distribution Services Ltd. The plan though had received shareholder's nod is yet to take the final shape.

This is due to the objection raised by the Bank of India who is the trustee of the bonds raised by Alpic Finance, which it planned to covert to equity following the demerger.