The Assets Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) will next week announce the successful buyer of Enterprise Bank, one of the three nationalised banks created after the 2009 banking crisis from the defunct Afribank, Bank PHB and Spring Bank.
The Managing Director, AMCON, Mr. Mustafa Chike-Obi, during an exclusive interview in Lagos on Tuesday, stated that “I will probably be announcing the results of the Enterprise process next week.”.
Chike-Obi said the new buyer would take over AMCON’s 100 per cent stake in Enterprise Bank.
The successful buyer, whose name he said might be announced on Monday, is said to be among the over 20 investors and banks that had jostled to buy the bridge bank.
The AMCON boss also disclosed that the advisers of the corporation have reduced the 23 investors lining up to buy Mainstreet Bank to just seven, with the bad assets manager hoping to name the successful buyer on October 31.
“Mainstreet may be a little bit delayed but may be still within the time frame of the bond redemption we set for ourselves, that is October 31,” he said.
“The process always starts with a lot of prospective buyers and AMCON-appointed advisers always do some interactions with them and we narrow it down based on a number of objective criteria.
“With Mainstreet Bank, we started with about 23 prospective buyers and I believe that we are down to seven prospective buyers now”, he stated.
He, however, said that the Mainstreet Bank’s sale would not be completed on schedule, adding that it would be delayed till the end of next month when the agency would be redeeming bonds worth N800bn.
AMCON had commenced the sale of Enterprise Bank and Mainstreet Bank last year and early this year, respectively.
The AMCON managing director had said the sale process of the two banks would be completed on September 15, 2014, after which the sale of Keystone Bank would begin.
Chike-Obi stated that AMCON would not commence the sale of Keystone Bank immediately after the sale of Enterprise and Mainstreet banks.
He explained, “We will review the Keystone Bank situation after the bond redemption. We have always announced that we would try and divest from Enterprise Bank and Mainstreet Bank sometime this year; that is still on course.
“And when we are done with the redemption of the bonds, we will take a look at Keystone Bank and see whether or not we want to divest any time soon. But right now, our plans have been made very clear and public; we have said we will divest from Enterprise Bank, Mainstreet Bank, ETI and Union Bank. We have done some other share sales but nothing significant.”
Asked if AMCON was no more willing to sell Keystone Bank, the managing director said, “We will definitely divest of Keystone Bank but the timing is what we have not discussed yet. We will look at it after we conclude the sale of Enterprise and Mainstreet banks as well as the bond redemption by October.”
The Central Bank of Nigeria had on August 5, 2011 revoked the operating licences of Afribank, Spring Bank and Bank PHB, which it said did not show enough capacity and ability for recapitalisation.
In their place, the CBN, through the Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation, established three bridge banks and transferred the assets and liabilities of the affected banks to the bridge banks.
Mainstreet Bank took over the assets and liabilities of Afribank; Keystone Bank assumed the assets and liabilities of Bank PHB, while Enterprise Bank took over Spring Bank.
Consequently, AMCON immediately acquired from the NDIC the three bridge banks and injected N679bn into them to meet the minimum capital base of N25bn and the minimum capital adequacy ratio of 15 per cent.
Mainstreet Bank received N285bn; Keystone Bank, N283bn; and Enterprise Bank, N111bn. – Punch.
