Divestment of Itella Bank to Savings Banks completed

Itella Corporation and Savings Banks have today closed a share transaction in accordance with the agreement signed in March, whereby Itella Corporation divests the entire share capital of Itella Bank Ltd to Savings Banks. The administrative bodies of the Savings Banks have approved the transaction.

In connection with the divestment, the name of the bank will change to Bank of Savings Banks Ltd, and Itella Bank's 29 employees will be transferred to Bank of Savings Banks as existing employees.

The change in ownership will not have any effect on the bank's customer or cooperation contracts. They will continue as usual. The Savings Banks Group will provide Itella with the payment traffic and other functions Itella needs for its services as a subcontractor.

Further information

Release announcing the divestment March 18, 2013

Itella:
CEO Heikki Malinen, tel. +358 20 452 3366 (MediaDesk)

Savings Banks Group:
CEO Pasi Kämäri, tel. +358 9 5480 5240 or +358 500 688 222

Itella Group provides solutions for managing information and product flows. Itella operates in the fields of mail communications, logistics, and financial management in Europe and Russia. Net sales in 2012 amounted to EUR 1,947 million. The number of staff is approximately 27,500. Corporate services are delivered under the Itella brand, while the Posti brand is used for services targeted at consumers in Finland. Further information is available online at www.itella.com.

The Savings Banks Group includes 32 Savings Banks and the central organization, the Savings Banks Association. They have 206 branch offices of their own, and through cooperation, customers have access to almost 400 offices, 200 service and payment machines and all cash machines in Finland. The mission of the Savings Banks is to promote saving and the financial well-being of their customers. Being customer-oriented and being local are the basic principles of the service. The goal is to achieve continuous, profitable growth and to maintain solvency at a secure level. Business profit in 2012 was EUR 67.1 million, solvency was 22.1%, and the number of customers was 588,500. www.saastopankki.fi