NTT Docomo to acquire SBI Sumishin Net Bank

NTT will take a roughly 8 % stake in SBI Holdings for about 110.8 billion yen by underwriting new shares to be issued through a third-party allotment scheme.

NTT Docomo plans to acquire nearly two-thirds of all outstanding shares in the online bank, including the one-third stake held by SBI Holdings, for about 420 billion yen. Another one-third stake is owned by Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank.

At a press conference on the day, NTT Docomo President Yoshiaki Maeda described SBI Sumishin as "a bank with high-level digital technology and a stable business foundation." Maeda noted that his company will use its foray into the banking business as an opportunity to "aim to provide more convenient and cost-effective financial services."

NTT Docomo hopes that bringing the online bank under its wing will help it grow its non-telecommunications operations while expanding its economic bloc based on its "d Point" reward point program.

As the mobile phone industry struggles with declining telecom fee income, NTT Docomo has been exploring ways to enter the banking business, in a bid to catch up with its three major rivals, who are using their banking units and reward point programs to expand their economic blocs.

While NTT Docomo has made online brokerage firm Monex Inc. and consumer lender Orix Credit Corp., currently Docomo Finance Inc., subsidiaries, it has not owned a bank.

 [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]