{"id":23454,"date":"2025-12-02T21:48:54","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T21:48:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/?p=23454"},"modified":"2025-12-02T21:48:54","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T21:48:54","slug":"canadas-fairstone-to-buy-laurentian-in-1-9-billion-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/?p=23454","title":{"rendered":"Canada\u2019s Fairstone to buy Laurentian in $1.9 billion deal"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

By Mathieu Dion and Christine Dobby<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

(Bloomberg) <\/em>\u2014 Laurentian Bank of Canada reached an agreement to sell itself to Fairstone Bank for $1.9 billion and will hive off its retail banking unit to focus on commercial lending.<\/p>\n

Fairstone will pay $40.50 per share in cash, a 20% premium to Monday\u2019s closing price. Prior to that deal closing, National Bank of Canada, the country\u2019s sixth-largest lender, will acquire all of Laurentian\u2019s retail and small-business assets and liabilities, according to a statement Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

National Bank\u2019s shares hit a record high, trading at C$170.54 as of 10:41 a.m. in Toronto. Laurentian shares rose 18% to their highest level since August 2023, reaching C$39.92 as of the same time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The deal would resolve longstanding questions about the future of Laurentian, which has struggled to keep up with larger rivals in banking technology. Two years ago the board went through a strategic review that ended without finding a buyer. That was followed by a major technology breakdown and the sudden departure of the chief executive officer.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Share<\/figure>\n

Fairstone is an alternative mortgage lender that also offers a variety of other financial products. It\u2019s closely held, but in January it announced that Smith Financial Corp., the vehicle of Canadian billionaire Stephen Smith, had taken a majority voting interest. Centerbridge Partners and Ontario Teachers\u2019 Pension Plan Board are minority owners, Fairstone said at the time.<\/p>\n

The deal will add \u201cscale and accelerate growth in commercial real estate across the country, particularly in Quebec,\u201d Fairstone said in Tuesday\u2019s statement. The firm plans to move its headquarters to Montreal and the deal includes a guarantee to maintain Laurentian\u2019s brand identity and commercial head office in the city.<\/p>\n

Those commitments to the province won the transaction the backing of the Caisse de Depot et Placement du Quebec, which is the largest shareholder in Laurentian with about an 8% stake, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00c9ric Provost will continue as Laurentian\u2019s CEO after the transaction is completed, which is expected late next year, subject to regulatory approvals. Fairstone will also acquire Laurentian Bank\u2019s capital-markets operation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Competitive Challenges<\/h2>\n

Laurentian has retail loans and deposits of $3.3 billion and $7.6 billion, respectively, while the small-business loans and deposits total $1.4 billion.\u00a0The amounts are relatively modest, but \u201cthe deal should further enhance NA\u2019s strong position in the Quebec market,\u201d Bank of Nova Scotia analyst Mike Rizvanovic wrote in a client note.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The deal \u201chighlights the challenges in competing within the Canadian lending market with a sub-scale franchise,\u201d he wrote. The deal follows Royal Bank of Canada acquiring HSBC Holdings Plc\u2019s Canadian assets in 2024 and National Bank buying Edmonton-based Canadian Western Bank earlier this year for $5 billion, giving it a bigger footprint in the western provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. That leaves EQB Inc. \u201cas the lone publicly traded smaller bank in the market,\u201d Rizvanovic said. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

National Bank won\u2019t assume any of Laurentian\u2019s bank branches or employees, and all branches of Laurentian Bank located in Quebec will eventually be closed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNational not only benefits by increasing its scale in its home province but does not have to deal with the legacy issues associated with Laurentian\u2019s branch system,\u201d Jefferies Financial Group Inc. analyst John Aiken said in a report, noting that Laurentian\u2019s \u201celegant exit\u201d is National\u2019s gain. \u201cGetting the assets, deposits and mutual funds at book value is simply icing on the cake.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

National Bank, which had revenue 13 times greater than Laurentian in fiscal year 2024, expects the deal to add 1.5% to 2% to adjusted earnings per share, which \u201cappears reasonable, while benefiting return on equity in the first year after completion,\u201d said Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Paul Gulberg.<\/p>\n

\n

\u2013With assistance from Melissa Shin.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a92025 Bloomberg L.P.<\/em><\/p>\n

Visited 647 times, 647 visit(s) today<\/p>\n

Acquisition banks bloomberg canadian western bank \u00c9ric Provost fairstone bank laurentian Bank National Bank<\/p>\n

Last modified: December 2, 2025<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Mathieu Dion and Christine Dobby (Bloomberg) \u2014 Laurentian Bank of Canada reached an agreement to sell itself to Fairstone Bank for $1.9 billion and will hive off its retail banking unit to focus on commercial lending. Fairstone will pay $40.50 per share in cash, a 20% premium to Monday\u2019s closing price. Prior to that<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23455,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[216],"tags":[237,23,3521,1236,3801,9035],"class_list":{"0":"post-23454","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mortgage","8":"tag-billion","9":"tag-buy","10":"tag-canadas","11":"tag-deal","12":"tag-fairstone","13":"tag-laurentian"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/23455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}