CFC Stanbic Bank is the official name of the proposed new entity created by the merger of the CFC and Stanbic banks’ pending approval from among others shareholders, Capital Markets Authority, Central Bank of Kenya (Minister of Finance).
The merger makes sense in that the 9th and 10th largest banks (both around $350m in assets) can merge to become the 4th largest bank in the country (after Barclays, KCB, Stanchart)
Sticking points are that the deal is structured to include the creation of new shares (113 million) that will be transferred to Stanbic in addition to buying a majority of Gambit shares (currently the largest shareholder in CFC). Gambit will still remain as the 4th largest shareholder in the bank after the merger.
To sweeten the deal, CFC Stanbic Bank will remain listed on the NSE and Stanbic Kenya will be a wholly owned subsidiary. Also, the statement points out that their branch networks complement each other, so perhaps only Mombasa (where they, and most banks, have branches on Nkrumah street) and branches in Uchumi stores may need a workout.
When the story first broke last year (despite having a caution), it sent CFC’s share price up 10X (to about 900 shillings) and this notice also advises shareholders to exercise caution in dealing their CFC shares until further announcements are made. The announcement was released on Friday (but not yet up on NSE site), and published in the newspapers on Saturday to perhaps dampen the speculative mood/euphoria and allow careful analysis to set in before Monday.
(I don’t have CFC shares but they have been very good stockbrokers to me. Unrelated to this is, I have Stanbic Uganda shares)
Not really a comment,which brokerage in Kenya caters to the diaspora, i mean a full service broker prefarably online ,like E-Trade in the US.
Phil… None… sorry!
Kelele,
What’s your source on the banks’ rating?
that should have been rankings…
CFC group has 40 bln total assets and stanbic has 29 so total is 69 bln, still lower thank NBK with 75 bln at number 5.
Phil: none really. They may lure you with online service promises, but they pften peter out once you sign up
coldtusker: nada yet. I got suckered by FD two years ago ‘online’ promises
nelie: The banks themselves for their official published 2006 which had NBK at 36 billion total assets, CFC 25.4, and Stanbic 25.8
@phil
http://kenyashares.com/ I never used them and I have no experience with them, but they seem to have you in their sights.
there’s a stock agent by the name of hisanet-their site is http://www.hisanetafrica.com/they supposedly offer realtime online account info-looks good but havent heard any feedback. any takes?
RE KenyaShares-site looks very amateurish afadhali Hasinet. In any case, online trading is not far-off.
Back CFC Stanbic, watchout StanChart is all i can say…
Phil,CFC is good a broker.In my opion as good as it gets.
what are your interest rates on car loans?