Aval Listing on NYSE Would Seek as Much as $1 Billion

Grupo Aval Acciones y Valores SA, Colombia’s biggest financial holding company, will seek to raise $500 million to $1 billion by listing shares in New York and may use the funds to buy banks in Central America and the Caribbean, Chief Executive Officer Luis Carlos Sarmiento Gutierrez said.

The company won’t sell stock in New York until preferred shares issued last month in Bogota, which have fallen 3.4 percent through yesterday, show a “more convincing” performance, Sarmiento, 50, said in an interview at his office in Bogota. Common shares in Grupo Aval have dropped 26 percent this year, the third-worst performer on Bogota’s IGBC index.