BNP selling final stake of First Hawaiian stock

French banking giant BNP Paribas, which at one time owned all of First Hawaiian Bank, plans to sell off its remaining 18.4 percent stake in the company.

Hawaii’s largest bank said after the market closed Tuesday that an affiliate of BNP intends to offer about 24.9 million shares of holding company First Hawaiian Inc. in a secondary offering underwritten by JPMorgan. This will be the fourth and final secondary offering from BNP since it began selling shares through an initial public offering in August 2016.

First Hawaiian didn’t immediately announce the offering price, but Bloomberg News reported that a source said it would range from $26.25 to $26.50 a share. The closing date for the offering was not immediately announced.

First Hawaiian will not receive any of the proceeds from BNP’s sale.

Shares of First Hawaiian closed up 20 cents at $26.65 Tuesday. The shares have gained 18.4 percent this month.

BNP began selling off First Hawaiian in the 2016 IPO to raise capital so it could meet regulatory requirements. The IPO was priced at $23 a share. Subsequently, BNP conducted secondary offerings in January 2017 and May, July and September 2018.

Since its IPO, First Hawaiian’s stock has closed as high as $35.19 and as low as $21.43. The shares plunged 22.9 percent last year in what was a down year for the overall market and a particularly bad year for financial stocks.

BNP, owner of San Francisco-based Bank of the West, acquired 45 percent ownership of First Hawaiian in 1998 when First Hawaiian and Bank of the West merged. BNP then bought the balance of First Hawaiian in 2001.

ON THE MOVE

Aloha Petroleum has announced the following:

>> Richard Parry, former president and chief executive officer, retired from the company last month. Parry was with Hawaii’s largest gasoline marketer and convenience store operator, Aloha Petroleum, for more than 10 years.

>> Tom Grimes has taken on the leadership of Aloha Petroleum. He previously served as vice president and chief financial officer of the company. Grimes started with Aloha Petroleum in 2002 and has been responsible for the cash management, accounting, customer service, finance and fuel supply functions.

Bank of Hawaii has announced that Anne Marie Puglisi is its new vice president and manager of employee relations at Bank of Hawaii’s People Services division. She has more than 20 years’ experience in employee relations, human resources and employment law in Hawaii and New Mexico. Prior to joining Bank of Hawaii, Puglisi worked in various capacities for the state of Hawaii, including as director of the Civil Rights Compliance Office in the state Department of Education, program manager for the Equal Employment Opportunity Office for the Department of Human Resources Development and deputy attorney general in the Employment Law Division of the attorney general’s office.