The shareholders of FCMB Group Plc have approved the company’s proposed capital raising of N150 billion to fund its ambitious growth plans.
This is as the shareholders also approved dividend payment of N9.9 billion, representing N0.50 kobo per share for the year ended December 31, 2023.
The shareholders gave their approval at the Group 11th Annual General Meeting (AGM) held at the weekend in Lagos.
Speaking to shareholders, the chairman of FCMB Group, Oladipupo Jadesimi stated that “in 2023, we continued to move forward on the path of good governance, improving our practices and bringing them into line with our long-term strategy and with the highest international standards in order to increase the confidence of our shareholders, investors and other stakeholders, in an environment that is demanding ever more transparency and stewardship of our environment.”
Jadesimi noted that “for the full year ended 31 December 2023, the Group declared a profit after tax of
N93.0 billion, representing an earnings per share of N4.70, up 201.0 per cent from full year 2022.”
He added that the group has resolved to pay a final dividend of 50 kobo per share representing a dividend appropriation of N9.9 billion, a 100 per cent increase from 2022, saying that the Board of Directors at FCMB Group remain committed to delivering sustainable returns to shareholders.
He also said that this commitment is grounded on the deliberate consideration of facilitating sustainable business growth and capital requirements, with the overarching goal of optimising long term value for our shareholders.
Also, the group CEO of FCMB Group, Ladi Balogun said raising the additional capital would enable the group to secure a national banking licence as required by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Balogun said, “our first objective is to secure a national licence, which is what we will be doing by the capital raising.”
He said that the group will now be proceeding to raise capital up to N150 billion initially that will take substantially clear of the national licence and we hope to conclude that by the end of Q3 2024.
“Then we will commence the subsequent phases and the Phase Two will be to consolidate the bank’s franchise while the Phase Three will be starting sometime next year where we will close out the gap between Phase Two and Phase Three.”
“We have very clear plans and we have a number of options and any combinations of the options that we have will get us there.”
According to him, one of the advantages that we have as a group is that we are much more than a bank. The value of our individual businesses within the group is far greater than our market capitalisation.
“So, it gives us a lot of options and I am very confident that these options will gradually be falling in place and by next year when we come to the AGM for the 2024 financial year end, we should have certainly surpassed the requirement for national banking licence and be very advanced on meeting the international licence requirement.”
He added that the group’s aspiration is to raise enough capital to receive an international banking licence before the end of March 2026.
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