World Bank's finance arm agrees cornerstone stake in IHH: source

14/06/2012 - 3:33

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - The board of International Finance Corp (IFC), the financial arm of the World Bank, has approved a proposal to become a cornerstone investor in a planned $2 billion listing of Malaysia's IHH Healthcare, said a source with direct knowledge of the matter.

"It is pending the signing of the deal now," the source told Reuters on Thursday, declining to reveal the size of the investment as the talks were confidential.

IHH and IFC officials were not immediately available for comment.

The entry of IFC, which invests in the private sector in developing nations, could give a further confidence boost to the market debut of IHH -- the healthcare unit of Malaysian sovereign fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd.

This week IHH locked in Blackrock Inc , Capital Group and Och-Ziff Capital Management Group > as cornerstone investors for its dual listing on the Malaysian and Singaporean stock exchanges by end-July, sources told Reuters.

(Reporting by Yantoultra Ngui; Writing by Niluksi Koswanage; editing by Stuart Grudgings.)