In compliance with the government's decision, Vneshtorgbank, which is Russia's second-largest bank in terms of assets and equity, approved in March the placement of 1,700 billion newly issued shares worth 17 billion rubles (about $6.6 billion) through an open subscription on the Russian market and abroad in the first half of 2007.
"We plan to place 22.5% of our stock and hope to raise more than $6 billion," the source said.
Earlier reports said VTB would float up to 25% of its enlarged charter capital in a global offering on the London and Russian bourses.
Vneshtorgbank earlier said VTB would accept applications from individuals for its offering in Russia from April 9 through May 7, with the minimum price of bids totaling 30,000 rubles (about $1,153).
VTB has also set the price range for its global offering at 11.3-12.9 kopecks per share, the source said.
The Russian government is VTB's key shareholder, holding 99.9% of its stock. After the share placement, the government's stake in Vneshtorgbank is expected to drop to 75% plus one share.
VTB's share placement follows the share offering by state-run retail savings bank Sberbank.
Sberbank held its domestic rights offering of 3.5 million new shares at 89,000 rubles (about $3,396) per share through open subscription between February 22 and March 24 to raise 230.24 billion rubles (about $8.86 billion) to meet growing demand for loans, the bank's press office earlier said.
Overall, Sberbank placed 2,586,948 shares, or 73.9% of its new share offering, the bank's press office said.
