After a hotly fought contest, the government of Indonesia has mandated UBS and Danareksa to advise it on the sale of Bank Permata. Local observers say a verbal mandate was given out on Friday, although nothing official has been announced yet and neither bank is able to confirm the mandate.
Other banks understood to be bidding for the Permata advisory role include CSFB, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and ABN AMRO.
The mandate could be perhaps the last of the big bank sales, a process that has been underway since March 2002 when IBRA sold its stake in BCA to the Farallon Consortium. Since then four...
