Bank of America may record a pretax gain of almost $360 million and bolster its capital by selling most of its stake in BlackRock.
Bank of America sold 43.6 million shares on Monday at $163 each and plans to sell 2.45 million more shares directly to an institutional investor and 5.21 million shares in the next 30 days to meet demand, BlackRock said Tuesday in a statement. BlackRock spokesman Brian Beades declined to identify the institutional investor poised to buy the 2.45 million shares.
The combined 51.26 million shares are about 26% more than planned when the sale was announced Nov. 3 and would total $8.36 billion at Monday's sale price, according to the filings.
Bank of America's 34% stake in BlackRock had a carrying value of $10.2 billion, or about $156 a share, according to a Sept. 30 regulatory filing. The bank acquired the stake through its 2009 purchase of Merrill Lynch.
The bank had no comment on its expanded sales of BlackRock shares because the transactions aren't complete, spokesman Jerry Dubrowski said. The bank's economic interest in BlackRock would decline to 7.1% from 34%, pending completion of the sales, according to a BlackRock filing Monday.
Reporter Douglas Appell contributed to this story.
