Harel Insurance Company purchased a NIS 1 billion mortgage portfolio from Discount Bank. Harel acquired 80% of the total portfolio, at a value of about NIS 1.25 billion, and Discount was left with a holding of 20% of the portfolio.
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For Discount, this is the first sale of a mortgage portfolio, as part of its capital management strategy. Discount will grow in the mortgage sector by 26.5% in 2021.
For Harel this is not the first deal in the field. In the past, it has made similar transactions with Bank Hapoalim, Mizrahi Tefahot and Leumi. The value of Harel’s total mortgage portfolio before the last transaction was about NIS 3.2 billion, and following the purchase of the additional portfolio, it will increase to about NIS 4.2 billion.
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Sami Babkov, Head of the Investment Division at the Harel Group
(Photo: Vardi Kahana)
Yuval Gavish, Deputy CEO and Head of the Business Division at Discount Bank, said that “the deal with Harel is another breakthrough for Discount and the development of skills that will serve us in the future as well as the Bank’s continued accelerated growth.”
Sami Babkov, Director of the Harel Group’s Investment Division, said that “The transaction to purchase the mortgage portfolio from Discount Bank joins a series of acquisitions we have completed in the past and demonstrates Harel’s high capabilities in making complex non-negotiable credit transactions. Current return with low credit risk for savers. “