Singapore's OCBC unit to buy Barclays' Asian unit for $320 million

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - A unit of Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp , Singapore's second-biggest lender, said it has agreed to buy part of the Asian wealth unit of Barclays for $320 million, its second major private banking acquisition since 2009.

OCBC beat DBS Group Holdings , the other bidder left in the race, sources with knowledge of the matter said, after a competitive bidding process that saw several Asian and European bidders taking interest in the initial round.

With the addition of the Barclays wealth and investment management unit in Singapore and Hong Kong, OCBC's Bank of Singapore unit will see its assets under management rise by about 33 percent to $73.3 billion.

 

(Reporting by Saeed Azhar; Editing by Eric Meijer)