Four entities have placed bids to buy the country's second-largest brokerage house Daewoo Securities Co. in a deal that could be a possible game changer for at least three of the four prospective buyers, informed sources said Monday.

The prospective buyers are KB Financial Group Inc., the largest banking giant by assets; the country's leading asset management expertise firm Mirae Asset Group; Korea Investment Holdings Co.; and the employee stock ownership association led by Daewoo's labor union.

The four also submitted preliminary bids to take over a 43-percent stake in Daewoo Securities from the state-run Korea Development Bank, along with a 100-percent stake in KDB Asset Management.

A 43-percent stake in Daewoo Securities is currently valued at around 1.5 trillion won ($1.27 billion), but market observers say the proposed deal will likely be worth more than 2 trillion won, considering a premium for the control of the brokerage firm and possibly the local brokerage market.

A successful bid by any of the prospective buyers except the employee ownership association could make them the largest brokerage firm by assets.

"KDB plans to name a preferred bidder through a decision by its committee on the proposed sale of the financial subsidiary on Dec. 24," the bank said in a released statement.  

The deal itself is expected to be concluded within the first half of next year.

KDB acquired Daewoo Securities in 2000 after the brokerage firm went bankrupt in the midst of the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s.

A previous attempt to privatize the securities firm, as well as KDB itself, in 2008 fell through. (Yonhap)