BUDAPEST: OTP Bank will acquire a small bank “within two months”, chairman-CEO Sándor Csányi said in an interview with VS.hu. “We will buy a small bank in a country where we are already present within two months,” Csányi told the news portal. “We can best realize synergies where we already have a unit. In these countries, we are looking at everything that is for sale, and if we are smaller, we try to achieve a more rational business scale,” he added.
“In countries where we are not present, we only make acquisitions if we can buy a big bank, one with around 10% market share,” he said. Csányi said OTP was not planning to buy a big bank in neighbouring countries at present, but could look further afield. Csányi told shareholders at an annual general meeting late in April that OTP was prepared to make acquisitions and could make a small purchase in a single country. In addition to Hungary, OTP has businesses in Bulgaria, Croatia, Montenegro, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia and Ukraine.