Greece's Piraeus Bank will raise more than 19.5 percent of the funds it needs to plug a 7.33 billion euro capital hole from private investors in a rights offering that ends later on Tuesday, a senior bank official told Reuters.
Piraeus is the third major Greek lender, after Alpha and National Bank, to raise at least 10 percent of its common equity issue from private investors, a requirement under a recapitalization program forbanks to stay privately run.
"Private sector take-up willbe more than 19.5 percent,near 20 percent," said a senior banker at Piraeus who declined to be named. Meeting the minimum threshold meansPiraeus will not need to resort to issuing costly contingent convertible bonds, or CoCos.
