OREANDA-NEWS. March 5, 2010. The shareholders of Forum Bank <FORM UK U/R> supported the proposal to increase the bank’s charter fund by 107% to UAH 4.7bn. For this purpose, the bank will issue 242mn of new shares at par of UAH 10. No further details of the deal have been disclosed. The day before, German Commerzbank, the majority shareholder of FORM, increased its stake in the bank’s capital from 63% to 89%.

Millennium Capital sees the news to be positive for Forum, since the charter fund increase will improve its capital adequacy ratio (CAR) to over 25%, which corresponds to the NBU stress test requirement and exceeds the required normative (10%) considerably. The capital increase will enable the bank to make not only sufficient reserve deductions, estimated at UAH 1.5bn, but also to expand its credit portfolio by around 5% in 2010. Currently Millennium Capital is revising the recommendation on FORM’s stocks, maintaining positive outlook on the bank’s performance.