David Pieris, Indra Silva and Nimal Perera among main buyers of Combank shares

High net worth investors David Pieris, Indra Silva and Nimal Perera were among the main buyers of the shares of Sri Lanka’s largest private bank, Commercial Bank of Ceylon PLC (Combank), in the period starting April 1, 2020 to July 10, 2020, Mirror Business learns.

Since the Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE) re-opened on May 11 after a 51-day break due to coronavirus lockdowns, a lot of foreign institutional investors (FIIS) were seen shedding their stock holdings in a number of Sri Lankan blue chip companies.

Ntasian Discovery Fund and T. Rowe New Asia Fund, who were among the top 20 shareholders of Combank as at March 31, 2020, were not among the top 20 shareholders of the bank as at July 10, 2020.

As at March 31, 2020, Ntasian Discovery Fund held 37 million Combank shares, which amounted 3.85 percent of the issued shares of the bank while T. Rowe Asia Fund had 1.53 percent stake or little over 14.7 million shares.

The new entrants to the top 20 shareholders of Combank as at July 10, 2020 were David Pieris Group Chairman David Pieris and high net worth investor Nimal Perera.

As at July 10, 2020, David Pieris held 21 million Combank shares or 2.14 percent as the bank’s 10th largest shareholder while Nimal Perera, through a Seylan Bank margin facility, held 6.3 million Combank shares or 0.64 percent stake as the bank’s 20th largest shareholder.

Indra Silva, the bank’s third largest shareholder had upped his stake to 8.59 percent as at July 10, 2020 from 8.07 percent as at March 31, 2020.

Norwegian Central Bank, Norges Bank had also increased its stake in the bank to 3.86 percent as at July 2020 from 2.35 percent as at March 31, 2020, while trimming its exposure to the bank’s non-voting shares.