Procedures for an initial public offering (IPO) are expected to start in April, after the bank has released audited operating results for 2016.

According to several media reports, NLB and SSH officials will first stop off in the City of London, and then in mid-week visit New York and Boston on the US East Coast.

SSH chairman Lidia Glavina would not comment on the road-shows in an interview run by daily Delo on Saturday, merely saying that SSH was involved in preparatory activities to be able to start selling NLB.

"As you will know the planned mode of sale is through public offering, which is governed by very strict communication rules, so all I can say is that we are doing everything necessary for a successful sale."

Glavina did say though that the procedures at this stage were not yet formal IPO procedures. These would not start until an IPO intent is released.

Once the IPO intent has been published, the prospectus will as a rule be published within two weeks stating the price range per share.

The formal IPO procedure is expected to follow the release of the bank's audited results in late April. Unaudited figures put NLB net group profit for 2016 at EUR 110m, up 20% from 2015.

Asked when SSH and its financial adviser Deutsche Bank would publish an IPO prospectus, Glavina told Delo the timing would depend on the situation in the market and other factors, so she would not speculate.

The business daily Finance and TV Slovenija have reported that talks in Ljubljana have in recent days been held with representatives of the EBRD, which already owned a stake in NLB in the past, and the International Financial Corporation from the World Bank Group.

The final round of road-shows is to follow in late April, while the price range that prospective buyers would be willing to offer for NLB is to be known by 22 April, according to Finance.

By mid-April the NLB valuation commissioned from PricewaterhouseCoopers is expected to be completed. It will serve SSH as a major guideline in its decisions.

The price will be decisive in the decision for the sale, considering the bank received a EUR 1.55bn state injection in the last bailout in December 2013 alone.

The price should be at least in the range of the NLB book value. Data on the bank's website put the book value of NLB share as at the end of September 2016 at roughly EUR 63, which values NLB capital at EUR 1.26bn. Considering the book value, the state should get a little below EUR 1bn for 75% plus one share.

According to Finance, the sale should be completed by mid-May, while Glavina said that a "strategic investor" is out of the question under the current state asset management strategy.