UBA To Obtain Zambian Banking Licence

VENTURES AFRICA - Nigeria’s fourth-biggest bank by market value, United Bank for Africa Plc has revealed plans to meet Zambia’s new capital requirements in its bid to obtain banking licence in southern African country.

According to UBA’s managing director, Phillips Oduoza the bank intends to convert its licence from that of an international bank.

In January this year, Zambia raised the minimum capital requirement for international banks to $100 million from $2.5 million. It also raised that of local banks to $20 million.

Recently, Lagos-based newspaper ThisDay quoted Oduoza in a conference call saying “what we have done is to engage the regulators.”

Oduoza also said UBA expects its operations in markets outside Africa’s second largest economy, Nigeria, to contribute about 25 percent of earnings by end of the year, up from 19 percent in the first quarter and 22 percent in the year’s half.

At the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), the bank closed 3.2 percent lower at N4.60, paring its gains this year to 81 percent as the NSE All-Share Index rose 12 percent over the same period.

United Bank for Africa Plc (UBA) is the product of the merger of Nigeria’s third (the old UBA) and fifth (Standard Trust Bank Plc) largest banks, and a subsequent acquisition of the erstwhile Continental Trust Bank Limited (CTB). Formerly run by Tony Elumelu, its erstwhile CEO, the bank operates with subsidiaries in 20 sub-Saharan countries and representative offices in France, the United Kingdom and the United States of America, it also offers universal banking services to more than 7 million customers across 750 branches.