Fortis agrees to acquire Dominet

BRUSSELS, Belgium --Fortis NV, an insurer and financial services company, said Monday it agreed to buy Dominet, a Polish retail bank, for an undisclosed sum.

Dominet, which specializes in consumer finance, employs 806 people across the eastern European country.

"International growth of our retail banking activities is a pillar of Fortis's strategy," said Jos Clijsters, chief executive of Fortis' retail banking unit.

Fortis, a Belgian-Dutch banking and insurance group, employs about 58,000 people and has a market value of around euro41.6 billion (US$53 billion).

The bank does most of its business in the Netherlands and Belgium but plans to expand, aiming to increase the amount of net profit it reaps from outside its home market from 20 percent to 30 percent by 2009.

Fortis CEO Jean-Paul Votron said in August the bank would continue with its push into retail banking in Germany and Poland. Fortis spent euro1.5 billion (US$1.93 billion) on acquisitions last year