INTERNATIONAL

NATIONAL BANK OF KUWAIT, WORLD BANK BUY IRAQI LENDER

National Bank of Kuwait, the Arab lender with the highest credit rating, agreed to buy the Credit Bank of Iraq in what may be the first foreign purchase of an Iraqi lender in at least four decades.

National Bank will hold 75% of the Iraqi bank and the World Bank’s International Finance Corp. 10%, said National Bank’s chief executive, Ibrahim Dabdoub. He declined to say how much National Bank, with a market value equivalent to $6.6 billion, is paying.

“Iraq’s medium-term prospects are very good, because in the end, this insurgency has to end,” Mr. Dabdoub said on the edge of a Middle East Economic Digest banking conference in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates. National Bank will take over managing Credit Bank, “hopefully before the end of the year,” he said.

International banks, among them HSBC Holdings Plc and Standard Chartered Plc, are competing to gain a foothold in Iraq, where the country’s oil reserves and population may help drive economic growth after more than two decades of decline because of war, sanctions and government mismanagement.

Iraq, the world’s no. 3 holder of oil reserves and the most populous Arab country in the Persian Gulf, nationalized its banking industry in 1964 and expelled foreign lenders.

HUTCHISON TELECOM PLANS $1.1 BILLION IPO

Hutchison Telecommunications International Ltd., controlled by Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, plans to raise as much as HK$8.81 billion ($1.1 billion) in an initial public offering in Hong Kong and New York.

Hutchison Telecom is offering 1.155 billion shares at HK$6.59 to HK$7.63 apiece, people involved in the sale said. It will offer American depositary shares at $12.67 to $14.67 each, with trading in New York to start on October 14, executives said. The shares are being sold by its parent Hutchison Whampoa Ltd.

Hong Kong-based Hutchison Whampoa, which is selling shares in its phone business in eight markets, is betting economic growth in emerging markets, and India in particular, will attract investors to its sale.

The company had outstanding loans of about HK$15 billion as of June 30, including long-term borrowing of almost HK$9.4 billion. Its liabilities exceeded its assets by HK$5.5 billion as of December 31, the company said in a filing to the American regulator this month.

– Bloomberg News