Core Investors Buy into Wema Bank

Core Investors Buy into Wema Bank

April 22nd, 2009

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The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced on its website that it had granted approval to the divestment of 2,700,000,000 ordinary shares of Wema Bank Plc to a core investor, SW8 Investment Ltd on April 1, 2009. According to SEC, the shares being divested represent 26.50% of the current issued and fully paid share capital of the bank. An agreement was earlier reached in August 2008 between the Commission, Central Bank of Nigeria, NDIC, Wema Bank and Odua Group that the Board and Management of Wema Bank shall, under the supervision of SEC, dispose of the warehoused shares of Wema Bank about (2.7 billion shares) in a transparent manner in order to improve the bank’s liquidity position and correct the irregularities in earlier sale of the shares.

Wema Bank Plc was incorporated in May 1945 as a private limited liability company and commenced business operations as a commercial bank in the same year. The Bank was converted to a public limited liability company in April 1987 and was subsequently listed on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange in January 1990. On February 5, 2001, the Central Bank of Nigeria granted a Universal Banking Licence to the Bank, thus allowing the Bank to undertake a wide range of financial services to its numerous customers across the country. The Bank has witnessed tremendous growth and development in branch network, quality of service delivery and overall financial performance in the last two decades.