Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc., the nation's second-biggest bank by market value, plans to buy "several hundred billion yen" of assets being sold by European lenders building capital to weather the region's debt crisis.
The Tokyo-based bank has received ¥7 trillion in offers from European banks, including infrastructure project loans, Sumitomo Mitsui President Koichi Miyata said in an interview on Dec. 21. Sellers of European banking assets currently outnumber buyers, he said.
"We'll take time and go for it once we find what we want" Miyata said. "Loans for projects in North America and Asia are the areas we are interested in."