Fifth Third Expects $225M Gain on Vantiv Offering

Fifth Third Bancorp (FITB) in Cincinnati is selling a $225 million stake in Vantiv (VNTV), its former subsidiary.

The sale would reduce Fifth Third's stake in the payment processor by 15%, it said Wednesday. Fifth Third plans to sell 15.6 million shares as part of a secondary offering in which a total of 38.6 million shares are expected to be sold. Vantiv plans to repurchase 17.5 million of the shares offered.

Fifth Third expects the sale to increase its second-quarter earnings by $145 million after tax. The $121 billion-asset company would have a 28% ownership stake in Vantiv after the sale.

There are ten underwriters of the secondary offering, including JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Credit Suisse (CS), Goldman Sachs (GS) and Morgan Stanley (MS).

Fifth Third sold a 15% stake in the payments firm last December, for a pretax gain of $140 million. Vantiv, formerly Fifth Third Processing, went public in March 2012.