Category Archives: Proparco

Equity Bank’s War Chest

Equity Bank has been on a tear, signing deals with other banks for affordable lines of credit for on-lending. The latest ones are with the African Development Bank and FMO.

The recent financing agreements include:

In 2020:

  • September 2020: $50 million (Kshs 5.5 Billion) loan facility with the IFC.
  • October 2020: $100 Million from Proparco (Agence Française de Développement Group) to enable Kenya MSMEs, women entrepreneurs who had been particularly affected by the economic shock of the COVID-19 crisis to create jobs. It is expected to impact 240 MSMEs firms which will create over 5,000 direct and indirect jobs.

In 2021:

  • March 4: EUR 125 million (Kshs 16.5 Billion) loan facility signed with the European Investment Bank. The long-term loan will support Equity customer to sustain and scale their operations, with Kshs 6.5 billion to agriculture and Kshs 10 billion to MSMEs.
  • March 10: $100 Million (Kshs 11 Billion) facility with DEG of Germany, CDC Group of the United Kingdom, and FMO of the Netherlands to support MSMEs cope with COVID-19 over three years.
  • March 15: USD 75 Million (Kshs 8.25 Billion) loan facility with the African Guaranty Fund to lend to women-owned and managed micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and DRC.
  • March 23: $10 billion (Kshs 11 billion) from the African Development Bank to support its expansion into Central Africa. The  tier-two facility with a 7-year maturity is also to support lending to women and youth entrepreneurs access capital to recover and thrive in a post-COVID environment.
  • March 25: $50 million (KShs 5.5 billion) NASIRA loan portfolio guarantee from Netherlands FMO, covering loans provided to MSMEs affected by the COVID-19 crisis, including women and young entrepreneurs and companies in the agri-value chain.

AVCA 2019 private equity and venture capital conference in Nairobi

The 16th annual conference of African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (AVCA) was held from 1st -3rd April 2019 at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Nairobi. A guest post by Marcela Sinda.

This flagship conference event for the African continent had a fantastic kick-off and turnout, bringing together private equity and venture capital investors who handle a portfolio of over $1.5 trillion in assets. This was according to Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for Trade, Peter Munya who officially opened the conference on behalf of President Uhuru Kenyatta. The goal of this kind of conference, he said, is to expose investors to the diverse prospective investment markets across the Africa as the continent was now being looked at as any other region, with the focus being around checking due diligence, ethics, looking at best practices and asking the same questions around deal sourcing.

 

DFI’s Role: Kenya is an increasingly attractive investment destination and according to AVCA data, it is the 2nd most attractive country for private equity investments in Africa over the next three years and hence an obvious choice to gather the industry players for this conference. The African PE sector has been shaped for decades by DFIs, and at AVCA 2019, there was some discussion about new DFI strategies for investment across Africa. Maria Hakansson, the CEO of Swedfund, noted that, as a community, DFIs could do so much more when it comes to anti-corruption, e-waste management, customer protection principles etc. and that Africa’s portfolio is constantly outperforming in terms of impact compared to other regions portfolio.

Djalal Khimdjee, Deputy CEO of Proparco said SMEs in Africa are essential towards job creation and achieving the sustainable development goals (SDG’s) and that 60% of the 1.5 million jobs that have been created in Africa every month come from SMEs and venture capital firms. He said that PROPARCO and French development agencies had committed £2.5 billion by 2022 to support African MSMEs, including £1 billion through private equity investments. 

Mathew Hunt, Principal at South Suez Capital shared that one of the reasons why investors are in Africa and especially now is because of the tech-driven growth that’s been on the rise in recent years. Venture capital investments are new in Africa and only a handful of funds have grown successfully.  The role of African Development Bank, said Robert Zegers, their Chief Investment Officer, was to now help support the industry and act as anchor investors in these funds as a lot of development agendas can be achieved by generating value through VC’s and great businesses.

The narrative throughout the discussion panels was around the real opportunities Africa presents for investment with building blocks in place such as improved policies, the rise in middle-income earners, the Africa Continental Free Trade Area, and enablers such energy, improved infrastructure and technology as pathways that cater for development needs. The most attractive areas for P/E investment were perceived to be consumer-driven sectors (financials, FMCG, agribusiness, healthcare and technology).

Deals Galore: VCs are willing and able to take risks and are looking to invest much more than they did previously. According to the  AVCA report 2018, VCs invested $725.6 Million in 458 deals a 300% leap in the total funding amount and over 127% increase in the number of deals as compared to 2017.  VC fund managers, therefore, need to have great entrepreneurial skills to identify numerous opportunities and create great pipelines for growth and expansion. This is the first generation of PE owners and from the lessons learnt, a good company always attracts a buyer and a great way for VCs to approach funding private companies is to ask; ‘if everything works out, how big can this be?’. But investors ought to be cautious not to misconstrue Africa as a single country with regard to investments, rather, and instead start by breaking down the micro trends in each jurisdiction and analyse the different risks.

Investments, not Aid: Charles Mwebeiha of Sango Capital urged investors to look at Africa while investing, like any other region in the world noting that many times, investing in Africa is made to sound like some sort of assistance. He offered that the issue should be whether returns can be made and reiterated that with good strategies, there is money to be made in Africa.

Women: It was also highlighted that having a gender-sensitive lens when investing is an imperative for an inclusive and fair investment strategy and that, especially in Africa, the number of female entrepreneurs supported is a key metric. There is an even split between male and female entrepreneurs on the continent but less than 2% of those women are getting formal funding as they are often working in hidden, informal sectors.

Exits: A major area of discussion was around exits. Carlos Reyes of the IFC,  pointed out that; “to prepare companies for exits, we try to improve reporting standards, corporate governance and we look at the bench – so if the entrepreneur leaves, who can come in? The succession process is quite important.” Exits are not the easiest but they are not deal-breakers and good exits can be achieved. At Leapfrog Investments, they evaluate exits right at the beginning, by sitting down with the owners to try to understand their dreams for the future so as to align funding with their plans for exiting.

Predictions: And finally, taking a forward look at the sector five years into the future, George Odo, Managing Director of AfricInvest Capital Partners observed that there would be more capital raised from African economies, more policy changes required to mobilise pension funds, much more experienced fund managers, and also more EA players paying attention to Ethiopia.

Glossary
AVCA – Africa Venture Capital Association
EA – East Africa
PE – Private Equity
LP – Limited Partners
DFI – Development Finance Institution
IFC – International Finance Corporation
PROPARCO – A Development Financial Institution partly owned by the French Development Agency
SME – Small Medium Enterprise
MSME – Micro Small & Medium Enterprises
VC – Venture Capital

I&M Bank Rwanda IPO Launched

Yesterday, I&M Bank Rwanda launched an IPO share sale that will result in the listing of the bank’s entire share capital at the Rwanda Stock Exchange. The Government of Rwanda will sell its entire 19.81% in the bank as part of its divestment from public enterprise policy, and through the sale of 90 million shares of the bank, they hope to raise 8.9 billion francs (~$10.8 million), which will go to the Rwanda government after deducting expenses.

Quick Notes

  • Minimum is 1,000 shares at RWF 90 per share, therefore the cost of investment is RWF 90,000 (~approx $109 or Kshs 11,350). Further purchases are in blocks of 100 shares.
  • Opens 14 February, closes 3 March 2017.
  • Allotment plan: 40% of the shares are reserved for international investors and 60% for domestic investors. The domestic pool is further broken down with 25% reserved for East African nationals, 5% for employees of the bank, 15% for Rwanda institutional investors (QII’s) and 15% for other East African QII’s.
  • The Plan is to list and trade the shares, in Kigali, as ‘IMR’ from 31 March 2017.

IN 2015, I&M Bank Rwanda (IMR) was the 3rd largest bank in Rwanda by assets (RWF 171 billion), behind Bank of Kigali (RWF 561 billion), and Cogebanque (RWF 178 billion). Other banks were KCB Rwanda (RWF 149 billion) and Equity Rwanda (RWF 93 billion). For 2016, IMR had assets of 206 billion francs in 2016, loans of 111 billion and deposits of 134 billion and a pretax profit of 8.4 billion francs. It’ has 17 branches, and plans to build a new headquarters ($25M) and install a new IT system ($4M). It’s business is in four mains sectors – construction, wholesale & retail, manufacturing, and agriculture.

I&M Bank Rwanda (formerly Banque Commerciale du Rwanda Limited – BCR) is the Rwanda subsidiary of I&M Holdings Limited. I&M Holdings listed on the Nairobi Securities exchange in June 2013. It is the oldest financial institution with over 50 years of existence and the first bank in Rwanda, having been incorporated in 1963Actis recapitalized the bank and became an 80% owner in 2004 and sold that 80% stake in 2012 to I&M (55%) and the governments of Germany and France who, through their development finance institutions of DEG and Proparco respectively, each retain 12.5%.

Odd points

  • IMR has entered three swap snap transactions with the National Bank of Rwanda (regulator) in which I&M has given $8 million to the regulator in exchange for local currency. I&M will receive 2% interest and pay the NBR 8% interest in local currency.
  •  In Rwanda, bank directors sign conflict of interest statements?!

More details in the prospectus from Dyer & Blair Investment Bank, who, along with BARAKA Capital Limited Uganda, are Lead Transaction Advisors. BARAKA Capital Rwanda is the Lead Sponsoring Broker.

EDIT

  • @imbankrw Feb 21Good News! The Sale of @imbankrw shares has been extended to March 10, 2017. Do not miss out on this opportunity. Apply Today. #OwnYourBank
  • @imbankrw 3 minutes ago Equity Credit offers an opportunity to our customers who need financing tobuy shares http://www.imbank.com/rwanda/loans/equity-credit/ … #OwnYourBank (I&M is financing purchase of shares, up to 70% of the value of shares, up to 15 million Rwf)

1 KES = 7.93 RWF and 1 USD = 823 RWF

Chase & AFD to Finance Renewable Energy in Kenya

This morning, Chase Bank and Agence Française de Développement (AFD) signed a 10 million Euro (~Kshs 1.12 billion), 12 year, credit line for onward lending to businesses that wish to invest in renewable energy projects.

Paul Njaga, the CEO of Chase said that, at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES), the bank had committed Kshs 60 billion to SME funding, and that so far Kshs 20 billion had been disbursed. They had got $40 million from Proparco for SME’s and that the new funding will go to bankable projects in solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, biomass etc. that don’t degrade the environment, as well as as for energy efficiency measures.

The French Ambassador said their renewable energy project, which was launched in 2010, has been great success; To date, $37 million has been used for renewable energy projects that collectively generate 22 MW, and some of these included mini-hydro plants at KTDA tea estates, and the Strathmore University solar roof. He said France has invested 1.5 billion Euros in Kenya over the last ten years, including project through Proparco, their private sector investing subsidiary.

The Kenya Association of Manufactures (KAM) will assist the projects sponsors on feasibility studies and technical support and AFD hopes to sign five more banks in the renewable energy scheme and extend it to Tanzania and Uganda.

Conversion: 1 EUR = Kshs 111, 1 US$ = Kshs 102.

Proparco in East Africa

French financier Proparco had a mini cocktail while their CEO Luc Rigouzzo was in Nairobi last week. The CEO, who grew up in Africa (Ivory Coast) talked about the group investments and potential they see in Africa, being real, not just afro-optimism statement.

In the banking sector, Africa with its 1 billion combined population has a potential urban population of 300 million banking customers, hence Proparco’ intervention in the banking sector as well as infrastructure sectors

Proparco with € 1.5 billion assets has 37% of loans and 26% of equity investments to Africa, and their loan portfolio at 2008 comprised 146 million Euros in east & central Africa, and 154m Euros in West Africa
Proparco invests in social, environmental investments for the public good and that transom poverty.

The consumer may not see or feel this kind as Proparco’s intervention is at a higher level with loans of € 5 to 30 million per project (over durations of 5 to 20 years) and up to to 100m in infrastructure, and equity of € 2 to 20 million (over 4 to 10 years)

Tea estate

In Kenya they have invested in Mumias sugar, I&M bank, Zain, Bank of Africa, Serena Hotels, KTDA) , NIC Bank, Rabai Power, Kenafric. Ormat (Geothermal), while Uganda has bugajali hydro power, DFCU, and in Tanzania they have Tigo.