{"id":284,"date":"2009-04-09T15:53:10","date_gmt":"2009-04-09T15:53:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.the-finance-zone.co.uk\/?p=284"},"modified":"2009-04-09T15:53:10","modified_gmt":"2009-04-09T15:53:10","slug":"barclays-agrees-to-sell-ishares","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/2009\/04\/09\/barclays-agrees-to-sell-ishares\/","title":{"rendered":"Barclays agrees to sell iShares"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barclays Bank has agreed a deal to sell its iShares asset management business as it looks to raise cash and avoid turning to the government for aid.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The exchange traded funds (ETFs)provider is being sold to private equity firm CVC Capital Partners for \u00a33bn ($4.4bn).<\/p>\n

However, Barclays is providing \u00a32.1bn of financing for the deal – in effect a loan to CVC to help it buy iShares.<\/p>\n

Shares in Barclays jumped 10% as a result of the announcement.<\/p>\n

“This transaction realises significant value for Barclays,” said the bank’s chief executive John Varley.<\/p>\n

“iShares has experienced rapid growth over the past several years and has reached a point where it can develop further on a stand alone basis,” he added.<\/p>\n

Cheap access<\/strong><\/p>\n

Barclays will still maintain links with iShares.<\/p>\n

“Barclays shareholders will benefit from a reinforcement of our capital base and an ongoing commercial relationship with iShares,” said Mr Varley.<\/p>\n

The iShares funds have proved very popular in the US, but have yet to really take off in the UK.<\/p>\n

ETFs are listed shares that pool investors’ money and track the performance of particular indexes.<\/p>\n

They are a cheap way for private investors to gain access to many different shares through a single holding. For example, the iShares FTSE 100 will track the performance of the FTSE 100 through a single share.<\/p>\n

The iShares business is the world’s biggest manager of ETFs, and is part of San Francisco-based Barclays Global Investment.<\/p>\n

While other High Street banks have accepted government money to help them through the credit crunch, Barclays has chosen instead to raise finance privately.<\/p>\n

Last year, the bank raised \u00a37bn from investors in the Middle East.<\/p>\n

The bank has also not taken part in the government’s insurance scheme for toxic assets.<\/p>\n

The Asset Protection Scheme uses government money to insure banks’ riskiest assets against further losses.<\/p>\n

Barclays reported profits before tax of \u00a36.08bn for 2008.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Barclays Bank has agreed a deal to sell its iShares asset management business as it looks to raise cash and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-banking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}