India's second largest bank, ICICI Bank, is planning to sell around 10 to12 per cent of equity in its broking arm, ICICI Securities Ltd., or I-Sec, in a pre-initial public offering placement of equity.

A release issued by the bank said that ICICI Securities has been valued at $7.5 billion or Rs.30,000 crore and this assessment puts the investment bank on the top of the valuation of JM Financial and Hemendra Kothari, when they divested their securities.

According to this assessment, a 10 to 12 per cent equity sale will fetch I-Sec between Rs.3,000 and Rs.3,600 crore.

It may be mentioned here that international financial institutions like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, Credit Suisse and Nomura are among others keen to pick up a minority stake in I-Sec. According to sources close to the development, I-Sec has already short listed around 10-12 expressions of interest (EoI) and the deal is likely to be finalized shortly.

The sources further revealed that 3 to 5 per cent will be placed with institutional investors ahead of the proposed IPO of ICICI Securities and the remaining 5 to 7 per cent will be sold to the public through a share sale.