DNB Bank ASA and Nordea Bank AB, the initial owners of Luminor business units in the Baltic States through a holding company Luminor Group AB, signed an agreement on 13 September 2018 with US based private equity firm Blackstone to sell majority stake in Luminor.
On 30 September 2019, Luminor and Blackstone announced the acquisition of a 60.1 % majority stake in the bank by a consortium led by private equity funds managed by Blackstone. DNB and Nordea each retained a 19.95 % equity stake and Blackstone agreed to purchase Nordea’s remaining stake over the following years.
In December 2021, Blackstone acquired 8.4 % of Luminor Holding from Nordea and in September 2022, purchased the remaining 11.6 % interest. As a result of this transaction, Blackstone now owns 80.05 % of Luminor Holding, and DNB will continue to own the remaining 19.95 %.
Becoming one pan‑Baltic financial services provider
On 19 February 2018, Luminor took the first steps to fill in prerequisites of the legal reorganization process by submitting a draft Merger Agreement to State Enterprise Register of Latvia and notifications to the Estonian Financial Supervisory Authority for branches opening in Latvia and Lithuania.
On 28 June 2018, Luminor received regulatory approval from the European Central Bank to carry out the cross‑border merger.
On 2 January 2019, Luminor has merged its Baltic entities and finalized the legal integration with a central office in Estonia and branches in Latvia and Lithuania.
The change has simplified our legal structure and will ensure fully integrated, customer‑centric Baltic banking operations.