China Construction Bank Corp said on Tuesday that Bank of America Corp's planned $6.6 billion sale of its shares would not affect its performance.
Bank of America Corp said the planned sale of most of its remaining stake in CCB would generate a gain of about $1.8 billion after taxes for the cash-strapped bank in its latest move to boost capital levels.
In a statement on its website, CCB said Bank of America's decision to sell most of its remaining shares reflected "market behaviour that stemmed from its own needs and will not have any impact on the bank's business and development".
China Construction Bank's strategic relationship with Bank of America since CCB's stock listing in 2005 has helped improve the bank's asset quality, it said.
CCB's total assets hit 11.8 trillion yuan ($1.86 trillion) at the end of September and its capital adequacy ratio was at 12.58 percent. The bank's non-performing loan ratio was 1.02 percent.
In the last three months, the biggest U.S. bank has agreed to sell nearly $15 billion of CCB shares, a holding originally acquired in 2005 to cement its strategic relationship with the Chinese bank and give it a stake in the fast-growing economy.
Bank of America and other U.S. banks began taking stakes in Chinese banks in the last decade as a way to enter a market that was difficult to penetrate on their own. But as U.S. banks have struggled in recent years they have sold the shares for gains.
Last week, Goldman Sachs Group Inc sold $1.1 billion of shares in Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd , a source told Reuters. Morgan Stanley last year agreed to sell its 34.3 percent stake in China International Capital Corp, China's top investment bank.
