DUBLIN (Reuters) - Ireland looked set to cut its shareholding in AIB Group below 50% for the first time since effectively nationalising it more than a decade ago, with plans to sell another 5% of the bank's shares on Tuesday.
The finance ministry said it plans to sell 132 million shares in an accelerated placement, reducing its majority stake in Ireland's largest mortgage lender to roughly 47% from 52%.
Dublin began gradually selling shares in AIB for the first time since a 2017 IPO at the start of last year through a share trading plan, and Tuesday's placing will mark the third time in the last year that it has sold a larger chunk in one go.
The state, whose stake was 71% at the start of 2022, named BofA Securities, Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) International and Goodbody Stockbrokers as joint bookrunners for the latest placing.
Ireland pumped 64 billion euros ($70 billion), or almost 40% of its then annual economic output, into the country's banks after a huge property crash in the late 2000s. Two banks that swallowed up around half of that capital still failed.
Dublin sold its final shares in Bank of Ireland last September and last month cut its holding in the third surviving retail bank, Permanent TSB (PTSB), to 57% when it sold shares in the bank for the first time since 2015.
($1 = 0.9124 euros)