FBN Holdings Rises by 10% to N808bn Ahead of ‘Offers’ Pricing
One of the Nigeria’s top financial services group, FBN Holdings Plc, market value increased by about 10% in the equities market as investors took position ahead of the company’s capital raise.
In the Tier-1 bank category, only FBN Holdings has released its first half of 2024 earnings scorecard. The banking group is also the only that has reported FX losses due to negative exchange rate fluctuations, signifying it have foreign currency liability exposure than asset.
According to data from the Nigerian Exchange, Ticker: FBNH gained about 9.76% week on week to close at N22.5 per share on Friday from N20.5 at the beginning of the week.
The soft buying momentum lifted the oldest financial services group listed in the domestic bourse to N807.644 billion ahead of fund raising announcement. At the current market price, FBNH is trading at 48.8% below its 52-week high in the local bourse.
While its current market price has created fresh entry point for investors seeking to take position, it will affects rights issue, public offer pricing- and, by extension, numbers of shares to issue to raise fresh capital needed to meet its new capital demand of N500 billion at the end of first quarter of 2026.
FBNH Holdings has peaked at N43.95 per share in the year during the early boom on the Nigerian Exchange, according to historical data from the domestic bourse.
And then, it retreated after becoming most valuable banking name in the equities market when its erstwhile Banking chair, Oba Otudeko, took up huge shares volume via Barbican Capital Limited.
The market has seen counter buying from the group current chairman Femi Otedola – but unlike his first entry purchase, that ushered him in as largest single shareholders, the latest buying had weak effects. As Otedola was buying, some shareholders were selling.
In a regulatory filing, FBN Holdings announced it received a notification dated July 7, 2023, from Honeywell Group Limited, that its affiliate, Barbican Capital, acquired 4,770,269,843 units of shares or 13.3 percent stake. That time, Otedola has 5.57% interest in the group.
This would have marked the return of Otudeko to the financial institution he once chaired before he was sacked by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in April 2021.
The acquisition resulted in Otedola losing his spot as the largest investor in FBN Holdings.
Despite acknowledging Barbican Capital’s investment, FBN Holdings retained Otedola as its majority investor, with Otudeko’s name and company missing from the list of shareholders with 5 percent and above stake.
At the annual meeting on August 22, FBN Holdings would seek shareholders’ approval to undertake a capital raise of up to N350 billion. The group hint that the capital raise transaction shall be implemented by one or more transactions.
Details showed that the group will consider issuance of shares, by way of a public offering, private placement, rights issue in the Nigerian or international capital markets, at price(s) to be determined by way of a book building process or any other valuation method or combination of methods.
Analysts said share-based offering will be priced in line with its market price on the Nigerian Exchange, where the group has 35.895 billion shares outstanding. #FBN Holdings Rises by 10% to N808bn Ahead of ‘Offers’ Pricing
