The bank will acquire ownership of the Unitrust brokerage firm from the Shoval family.
The Jerusalem Mortgage Bank is about to take its first steps in the capital market by acquiring control in the Unitrust brokerage firm, a Tel-Aviv Stock Exchange company. The bank will acquire full ownership in Unitrust from Zalman Shoval, controlling shareholder (60.1%) in the Yetzu company, and hence of the Jerusalem Bank. The consideration in this transaction is expected to be determined based on an external economic evaluation of Unitrust.
The Jerusalem Bank specialises in mortgages to the religious sector, and has for some time been endeavouring to obtain a licence to operate as a merchant bank. One step taken by the Bank and Yetzu was to tender a bid for the acquisition of control in General Bank. In this, however, they were not successful. The reason for their bidding was that it was felt advisable to reduce the bank’s dependence on a single field of operations, due to the risk inherent in the mortgage sector. The bank’s management seeks to enter into additional fields of operations. At the top of its list is private banking for foreign investors and capital market activity.