French Banks Boost Bids in Takeover War

Hoping to fend off a hostile offer from Banque Nationale de Paris, Societe Generale SA on Monday raised its bid for Paribas SA to $130.96 per share, or $21.2 billion.

Banque Nationale de Paris is offering $38 billion to buy Societe General and Banque Paribas.

SocGen raised its bid to five shares and $78 for eight Paribas shares, up from five SocGen shares and no cash. The new bid represents an 11.8% premium to Paribas' price on Friday, said Pierre Servan-Schreiber, a lawyer with Sullivan and Cromwell representing SocGen.

BNP on March 9 offered to buy SocGen and Paribas to create the only bank in the world with more than $1 trillion of assets. The bid came on the eve of the scheduled closing of SocGen's friendly $19 billion takeover bid for Paribas, which was indefinitely postponed by market regulator Conseil des Marches Financiers.

Under its latest bid, SocGen and Paribas would buy back as much as $2.61 billion of stock within 18 months.

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