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LONDON, Aug 21 (Reuters) - British state-backed lenderLloyds Banking Group has sold German life insurerHeidelberger Leben to a joint venture between private equitygroup Cinven and Hannover Re for around 300 million euros ($400million).
The deal, which helped boost Lloyds' capital by 400 millionpounds, and the separate 254 million pounds sale of a batch ofleveraged loans also announced on Wednesday could accelerate UKgovernment plans to start selling down its 39 percent stake.
"It's another step along the road to just focusing on thedomestic retail business, and another step along the road to afourth quarter dividend," said Mike Trippitt, director of banks'research at London-based Numus securities.
Lloyds shares have surged by more than 50 percent to around74 pence in the year to date, well above the UK government'sso-called breakeven price of 61 pence, prompting speculationthat a sale of around 5 billion pounds of shares is imminent.
The government has said it has no timetable or target pricefor the sale, but appointed JP Morgan in late July to advise onthe possible sale of stake in Lloyds and an 81 percent stake inRoyal Bank of Scotland.
Speaking at the bank's half-year results earlier this month,Lloyds Chief Executive Antonio Horta-Osorio said he expects thebank to be a "high dividend" paying stock in the future,potentially paying out at least half of itsearnings.
Shareholders have not received a dividend from Lloyds sinceit took over crisis-stricken lender HBOS in 2008. But managementare back in talks with regulators about restarting the payout, akey milestone in its long-term recovery plan.
Trippitt said the asset sales helped the bank's dividendaspirations because they left the bank with a cleaner, morestreamlined portfolio and boosted the bank's capital,encouraging regulators to allow the bank to return cash toshareholders.
The Heidelberger sale will result in a loss of around 330million pounds in Lloyds' group accounts but, combined with thesale of other assets, is expected to boost the bank's commonequity tier 1 capital by around 400 million pounds when itcompletes, Lloyds said in a statement.
