LONDON – Britain's Barclays Bank PLC said Monday it intends to dispose of its entire 19.6 percent stake in the U.S. asset management company BlackRock Inc., valued at $6.1 billion.
The bank said it will sell its holding through a registered offering and a $1 billion share buyback by BlackRock. Barclays acquired the stake when it sold its asset management division, Barclays Global Investors, to BlackRock in 2009.
Analysts at Investec Securities said the deal makes sense in that Barclays gets little advantage from its stake.
"Barclays may even see some modest incremental benefit accrue to the income statement from a reduction in regulatory restrictions over Barclays Capital's ability to trade with Blackrock as a function of the current ownership structure," the analysts said.
Shares in Barclays were up 1.7 percent an hour before the market close in London, while BlackRock was down 1.2 percent on Wall Street.
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