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State-owned People’s Bank subsidiary People’s Leasing and Finance PLC (PLC) is shortly expected to come up with a plan to restructure and manage People’s Merchant Finance PLC (PMB) in which it owns a minority shareholding, following Central Bank directive.

“The Central Bank has advised us to proceed with it,” People’s Bank Chairman Hemasiri Fernando told Mirror Business.

According to the interim financial statement for the quarter ended December 2014, People’s Bank and PLC collectively owned 39.20 percent of PMB shares, while PMB Managing Director Govindasamy Ramanan and Director Thushan Wickramasinghe collectively owned 29.82 percent of the shares.

The company is currently in the default board of the Colombo Stock Exchange for non-submission of the March quarter interim financials. Therefore, the latest shareholder information is not available at the moment.  

PLC Managing Director D. P. Kumarage said that People’s Bank and PLC collectively hold 39.20 percent of PMB, however, that it is not the majority share any longer. Fernando said all problems that have arisen from the ownership of the company against the Central Bank proposed management model have been resolved. “It’s not an issue anymore. We sorted it out,” he said.
 

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People’s Insurance IPO on the cards

People’s Leasing and Finance PLC (PLC) fully-owned subsidiary People’s Insurance Limited will be going for an Initial Public Offering (IPO) before the end of this year, subsequent to a pre-IPO placement.

“Yes, we will be listing before the end of this year,” Kumarage said when inquired by MirrorBusiness.

He noted that this was mainly due to the listing requirement stipulated in the Insurance Industry Act No. 3 of 2011.

When inquired on whether PLC has sold some of the shares of People’s Insurance to a foreign investor in a pre-IPO share sale, Kumarage said that any such transaction is yet to go through.

People’s Insurance, which carries out only general insurance business, contributed the largest share to the income of PLC group in the 2014/15 financial year, and added an underwritten profit of Rs.176.70 million. (CW)