(Bloomberg) -- The Indian lender that's been most hurt by a yearlong shadow banking crisis in the nation is getting a reprieve after a local media report that it's in early talks to sell a stake to an Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.-backed company.
Shares of Yes Bank jumped as much as 8.5% Wednesday. While the lender is the worst performer on the key Sensex and Nifty indexes in 2019, the move has pared its loss this year to 63%. Its 2023 dollar bonds rose for the sixth day, set for a record winning streak.
Alibaba-backed One97 Communications Ltd. is in talks to buy Yes Bank co-founder Rana Kapoor's 9.6% stake in the lender, PTI reported Wednesday. Report on the stake sale comes at a time when the Mumbai-based lender is struggling to raise funds to bolster its balance sheets.
Rating companies from India Ratings & Research Ltd. to Moody's Investors Service have downgraded credit profile of the bank in recent weeks, citing concerns about its capital buffers and its ability to raise funds. A spokeswoman for the lender declined to comment on the PTI report.
While the bank had sold shares to raise capital last month, it has to raise more funds soon to ensure growth and asset quality, Citigroup Inc. analysts led by Manish Shukla wrote in a note. Twelve percent of the bank's lending is to companies that are below investment grade, according to the note. Yes Bank continues to explore various means of raising capital, the lender said in an exchange filing Tuesday.
To contact the reporter on this story: Rahul Satija in Mumbai at rsatija1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Andrew Monahan at amonahan@bloomberg.net, Anto Antony
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