Ebtikar ups stake in subsidiary Bee to 99.9% through share swap: Non-bank financial services player Ebtikar Financial Investments Holding has upped its stake in e-payments platform Bee to 99.9% from 60% via a share swap, its parent companies MM Group and B Investments said in EGX filings (here, pdf and here, pdf) last week.

The swap: Bee shareholders will acquire new shares issued by Ebtikar in return for handing over the 39.9% stake. This will see MM Group’s stake in Ebtikar diluted from 49.9% to 40.5% and B Investment’s holdings reduced from 20.3% to 16.5%.

The shareholders: The swap is based on an agreement (pdf) signed in February with Bee’s former owner Technobiz Equipment (TBE), which agreed to hand over a 20% stake in the company in return for equity in Ebtikar. The remaining 19.9% of the shares were swapped with a second unidentified investor.

Where’s Vodafone in all of this? Last February Vodafone Egypt signed a MoU with Ebtikar to acquire a 20% stake in Bee and its other e-payments company, Masary, but nothing has been heard about the transaction since the summer.

Ebtikar has plans to go public: Back in February, MM Group framed the Bee takeover as part of its plans to IPO Ebtikar on the EGX, writing in the statement that the transaction was a prelude to a listing. Ebtikar said in June it was planning to sell shares in 4Q2021 but has not recently spoken of the transaction. Shareholders have yet to say how much of the company they may offer in a sale.