The Polish antimonopoly regulator KNF is thumbing through offers from funds interested in adding Alior bank to their portfolios. The Russian fund Apax will most likely take the lender, so long as Poland’s top insurer PZU agrees to be a part of a deal. Other buyers interested in taking over Alior include Blackstone, CVC Capital and Warburg Pincus. “Alior is a relatively small bank, with an insignificant share in the Polish financial market. Therefore, from KNF’s point of view, if a Russian fund takes over Alior, it wouldn’t have a heavy impact on the market,” said one KNF source as quoted in the daily Puls Biznesu.
