Spain's Caja Madrid buys Florida bank for 927 million dollars

Spain's Caja Madrid buys Florida bank for 927 million dollars
AFP - Monday, April 14 11:05 pm

MADRID (AFP) - Spain's second largest savings bank, Caja Madrid, said Monday it had bought City National Bank of Florida in the United States for 927 million dollars (618 million euros) in what it said was its biggest international operation yet.

City National Bank of Florida, the sixth biggest private bank in Florida with assets worth 2.7 billion dollars, posted a net profit of 68.5 million euros last year.

It employs 421 people and has 19 branches in Miami, where more than half of the population of 5.4 million is of Latin American origin, Caja Madrid said in a statement.

"Caja's Madrid's goal is to begin a prudent expansion to new markets in the region like Tampa, Orlando and Jacksonville with the aim of speeding up growth without altering the high levels of profitability," the statement said.

Caja Madrid has for years had a corporate banking office in Madrid. It also has offices in Lisbon and Dublin and recently opened an office in Vienna which caters to clients in central and eastern Europe.

In another statement issued late on Monday, Caja Madrid said it would group its strategic stakes in financial service companies into a separate company which it plans to float on the stock exchange before the end of the year.

The bank said it had taken the decision at a meeting on Monday.