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Tag: First Bank

  • Adelabu named ED of First Bank

    Adelabu named ED of First Bank

    The Chief Financial Officer of First Bank of Nigeria Limited, Mr. Adebayo Adekola Adelabu has been appointed an Executive Director of the bank.

    The appointment of Mr. Adelabu, who still retains his portfolio as the Chief Financial Officer, is subject to the approval of  the Central Bank of Nigeria.

    The choice of the new director, according to the Group Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of First Bank, Mr. Bisi Onasanya is to enhance the capacity of the Executive Management and Board, by deepening specialization and strengthening the corporate governance culture of the Bank.

    A first Class accounting degree graduate from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife and an alumnus of global accounting firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Adelabu was formerly the Group Financial Controller of the Bank between 2009 and 2010 and the pioneer head of Business Performance Monitoring Department between 2005 and 2007.

    Under his leadership, the existing performance management framework for the Bank was set up while he was also credited with the successful execution of the Bank’s medium term strategic plan targeted  at profitable growth with respect to revenue maximization and cost optimization. He also had a brief stint at Standard Chartered Bank between 2007 and 2009 as General Manager and the West African Regional Head of Finance and Strategy.

    Adelabu is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria with over 20 years of global and far-reaching professional experience in Banking, Audit and Management consulting.

    Commenting further on the appointment, Mr. Onasanya said as the leading financial services institution in Nigeria, the Bank is keen on ensuring adherence to international best practices in the constitution of its Board and Management. “We, therefore, continuously seek the most capable talents in-house and in the industry to fill vacant positions within the group,” he said.

     

     

  • First Bank finances Broron’s oil vessel

    First Bank finances Broron’s oil vessel

    First Bank of Nigeria Plc has solely financed the multi-million dollar brand new oil and gas vessel, DSV Arianna. This is a milestone considering the poor response of Nigerian banks in funding oil and gas projects in the country.

    DSV Arianna is a brand new 78-metre ROV support and multifunctional field maintenance vessel acquired by Broron Oil and Gas Limited to service its clients such as Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited and Addax Petroleum Limited.

    First Bank’s Group Head, Corporate Banking, Ikeja 1, Oluremi Ajose-Adeogun, who spoke to our correspondent during the christening ceremony of the vessel in Lagos, said the bank found the oil company competent. This, he said, was why First Bank chose to fund the acquisition of the vessel. Although she didn’t reveal the amount the bank spent in financing the vessel, she said they (First Bank) didn’t syndicate the loan with any other bank.

    She said: “There are a lot of potentials in the industry for Nigerians that own vessels in the oil and gas industry and we think if the banks are willing to support Nigerians that have the capacity in terms of knowledge of the industry and the wherewithal to execute contract of this nature, we can do a lot to stimulate the economy.

    “In the past most of the foreign companies are the ones that have vessels of this nature and as a result we had a bit of capital flight in the sense that money that should be spent in the economy was taken out by the foreign companies that own the vessels.

    “But now a lot of Nigerians have seen the potentials and are going into it and is good if the banks can support the Nigerian companies that are willing to do the business.”

    On what attracted the bank to fund the project despite the company being a relatively unpopular in the oil and gas industry, she said “what attracted us to finance the project is because the company has an existing contract it was running with a foreign leased vessel, so when the company approached us to fund the purchase of its own vessel, and we could see our way out of the finance, we decided to support them.”

    Commenting on the level of support by Nigerian banks to the oil and gas industry, she said that Nigerian banks are financing a lot of oil and gas projects. Apart from First Bank, which is doing a lot in that regard, other banks she added are doing something too. “if Nigerian banks cannot finance Nigerian companies, who will?,” she quipped.

    She said: “First Bank didn’t syndicate the loan with another bank. There are a lot of other such requests for financing but the bank evaluates them based on its risk acceptance criteria. For instance, in a project such as this vessel, we consider the company’s experience to be able to deploy the vessel. We also consider your experience in the industry job, the contract and consider if you have the capacity to execute the contract and also ask ourselves if we can see our way out of the loan if we lend you the money. When we have transactions that are viable, we are always willing to finance them, she added.

    Broron Oil and Gas Limited provides marine, subsea construction and maintenance services, pipeline and piping engineering, project management services and procurement support services. The company led by Henry Ojogho.

    The company currently has an ongoing contract agreement with Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited to provide a multifunctional Field Maintenance Vessel (FMV) at QIT (Qua Iboe Terminal) with DPII capabilities for the following field operations: diving, survey operations for positioning and subsea inspection and seabed imaging with ROV

  • FirstBank appoints EDs

    First Bank of Nigeria Plc has announced the appointment of Messers Gbenga Shobo and Dauda Lawal as Executive Directors, Retail Banking (South) and Public Sector (North) respectively.

    The bank said in a statement that the appointments, subject to the approval of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), are geared towards further enhancing the capacity of the Executive Management and Board, by deepening specialsation and strengthening the corporate governance culture.

    According to the Bank’s Group Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Bisi Onasanya, the appointments represent the lender’s continuing transformation project, which is focused on exceeding customer expectations.

    “I am pleased to welcome Gbenga and Dauda to the board of FirstBank Nigeria,” he said.Their track records typify our bank’s value systems which are hinged on dependability, entrepreneurship, integrity, resilience, dynamism and service excellence.

    I have no doubt that they will both make the expected impact as we make progress with the bank’s focused transformation for sustainable growth and modernization, leading to enhanced values for all stakeholders, including customers and our esteemed shareholders”, he said.

  • First Bank: New structure, greater values

    As shareholders prepare for the September 24, 2012 extraordinary general meeting, emerging details on the restructuring of First Bank of Nigeria (FBN) Group into a holding company showed strong potential for increased values for shareholders.
    Under a new banking regulatory framework introduced in 2010 by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), banks are required to concentrate fully on core banking functions. The new model requires banks to either sell all non-core banking businesses or form a holding company to hold such non-core banking businesses including activities such as insurance, asset management and capital market operations.
    First Bank and four other banks have opted for restructuring of their group universal banking operations into holding company structure. Other banks are seeking to divest from non-core banking operations.
    The largest banking group in Nigeria and easily one of Africa’s largest financial services institutions, the choice of holding company complement the existing group structure of First Bank while creating new synergies that eliminate overlapping functions and loopholes and enhance the efficiency of the group structure.
    First Bank Group consists of 11 subsidiaries operating in various segments of the financial services industry from pension custodian, asset management, investment banking, insurance, and microfinance banking entities. Besides, the bank also holds investments in companies with international presence in the United Kingdom and France through its subsidiary FBN Bank (UK) Limited, in addition to representative offices in South Africa, China and Abu Dhabi.
    Market pundits said the new structure would enhance the productivity of the FBN Group, thus creating values for shareholders along the component structure.
    Managing director, Cowry Asset Management Limited, Mr. Johnson Chukwu, said the decision to restructure into holding company was the best option for shareholders of First Bank.
    According to him, the holding company structure would create more values for shareholders given that subsidiaries under the FBN Group are doing quite well and are leaders in their various segments.
    He noted that with the new structure, shareholders of First Bank would be able to fully unleash the latent potential and returns locked in the subsidiaries pointing out particularly the long-established strengths of the bank in investment banking.
    Investment advisor and securities expert, Sterling Capital Markets Limited, Mr. Sewa Wusu, said the realisation of the holding company structure would enhance the competitiveness of each component as the performance of the core banking operations and other businesses can be measured distinctively against similar businesses.
    He said the new structure would lead to increased profitability as all the members of the holding company would contribute profit to the centre, which would now be shared to investors.
    He added that holding company would ensure better preservation of assets of the group as any infraction in a particular segment could easily be contained while the holding company could use its influence to source additional funds for operations of the subsidiaries.
    “I think it’s a good development, there is nothing wrong with the new structure. It’s the same group structure only that the new system will create better values and enhance the profitability of each component,” Wusu said.
    Shareholders said they were impressed by the clear sense of direction outlined by the management of the bank.
    General Secretary, Independent Shareholders Association of Nigeria (ISAN), Mr. Adebayo Adeleke said shareholders were particularly happy that the bank’s holding company arrangement is devoid of complexities that have been known to result in fractional shares in other cases.
    According to him, the arrangement where all existing shares of First Bank are transferred entirely to the holding company in the name of the beneficial owners, following which the same number of units and percentage would be held in the new entity is better for shareholders.
    He noted that each of the companies would be seen as they are, rather than as a bunch, just as it would ensure that the value that has been built in these 11 companies by First Bank shareholders over the years would not be lost.
    “We are excited about the development; we are going to get value, because everything we have would be transferred to the holding company. There will be no manipulation as a result reconstruction that usually leads to fractional shares,” Adeleke said.
    Speaking earlier on the plan, group managing director, First Bank of Nigeria (FBN) Plc, Mr. Bisi Onasanya said the new structure will enhance the bank’s competitiveness, besides streamlining and coordinating various operations across non-bank financial services.
    According to him, it would enable the group to exploit opportunities for synergies between subsidiaries, while aligning the ownership and operation of the subsidiaries and businesses with current CBN regulatory requirements.
    Under the new structure, shareholders of First Bank will be migrated to FBN Holdings as at the terminal date by way of a share-for-share exchange between the shareholders of First Bank and FBN Holdings. Also, First Bank’s stakes in each of the holding company subsidiaries and associated companies will be transferred to FBN Holdings, while First Bank’s shareholdings in each of the Investment Banking and Asset Management (IBAM) subsidiaries will be transferred to FBN Capital Limited. FBN Capital will in turn be owned by FBN Holdings, an arrangement that will not alter the current beneficial shareholding structure of the FBN Group.
    Shareholders of First Bank are expected to approve the proposal to transfer the shares to the new structure, after which an application would be submitted to delist First Bank shares from the Nigerian Stock Exchange, and listing of FBN Holding shares next month.
    Onasanya outlined that the new structure would create an operating model that will profitably grow the bank’s presence in the market for commercial banking and non-banking financial services in order to achieve the aspiration to be the dominant financial services group in Sub-Saharan Africa.
    “The holding company would result in the creation of a corporate centre with responsibility for setting strategic direction, providing group-wide oversight and ensuring the leveraging of synergies across the group through the constitution of a governing board and committees at the group level to optimally align corporate governance and management roles,” Onasanya pointed out.
    Market analysts said the new structure would further enliven the performance of bank, which had doubled profit in the first half of this year. Half-year report of First Bank for the period ended June 30, 2012 showed that net profit doubled by 124.6 per cent to N46.01 billion as against N20.48 billion posted in comparable period of 2011. Gross earnings had grown by 25.6 per cent to N182.30 billion compared with N145.09 billion in corresponding period of 2011.
    The first half report was a significant consolidation on the first quarter performance. First quarter report of First Bank for the period ended March 31, 2012 showed that gross earnings rose by 42.5 per cent to N92.3 billion as against N64.8 billion in comparable period of 2011. Operating income increased to N74.2 billion compared with N49.4 billion in 2011. Profit before tax stood at N28.9 billion in first quarter 2012 as against N14.3 billion in 2011, an increase of 101.6 per cent. Customers’ deposits also rose by 31.1 per cent from N1.6 trillion in 2011 to N2.1 trillion in 2012.
    The performance trend this year supported the growth outlook indicated by the latest audited report and accounts of the bank for the year ended December 31, 2011. The report showed a 27.6 per cent growth in gross earnings to N296.3 billion as against N232.1 billion recorded in 2010. The bank also secured a 45.6 per cent growth in operating income to N259.2 billion contrary to N178.1 billion the previous year. Total deposit growth of 34.3 per cent to N1.9 trillion and was driven by low cost current and savings accounts, leading to a further reduction in total funding costs to 1.7 per cent from 3.1 per cent in the previous year. First Bank’s shareholders’ funds increased from N339.2 billion in 2010 to N365.48 billion in 2011. Cost to income ratio firmed up to 56.8 per cent while earning per share rose to N1.40 as against 95 Kobo in 2010. Consequently, the bank increased cash dividend by 33.3 per cent to 80 kobo for the 2011 business year as against 60 kobo distributed for the 2010 business year.