According to the The Cable Access Bank has bought Diamond Bank.
It is been reported that acquisition was overseen by CBN in a bid to further consolidate the banking industry.
Last week, Diamond Bank announced that it was dropping its international operating licence and would instead focus on national operations.
Last week, Diamond Bank announced its decision to drop its international operating licence to focus on national operations following capitalisation issues.
Diamond Bank’s chief executive officer, Uzoma Dozie had said then that the bank (Diamond)
“With this approval, the bank will cease to operate as an international bank,” Dozie had said.
“The re-licensing as a national bank supports Diamond Bank’s objective of streamlining its operations to focus resources on the significant opportunities in the Nigerian retail banking market, and the economy as a whole.
“The move follows Diamond Bank’s decision to sell its international operations, which included the disposal of its West African Subsidiary in 2017 and Diamond Bank UK, the sale of which is currently in its final stages.
“The change to national bank status also enables the bank to maintain a lower minimum capital requirement of 10 per cent, as against 15 per cent required for international banks.”
Prior to that, the bank recorded its worst month on record in November that saw its share fall to 0.61k per unit.
It’s Q3 2018 report had showed that the bank was also under some financial stress with profit after tax falling from N3.9 billion in 2017 to N1.6 billion. This also affected its earnings per share, which also dropped sharply from N17 in 2017 to N7 in 2018 which reduced the company’s market cap to N22 billion.
The Central Bank also fined the Bank N250 million for “aiding” MTN Nigeria who was accused of illegally repatriating $8.1billion.
In a statement, the Apex Bank said:
“Your bank issued three CCIs in favour of Dantata Investment for the sum of $5million without converting the foreign exchange received into Naira as required by our regulations. On the basis of these illegally issued CCIs, your bank repatriated the sum of $102,545,336.77 in respect of these CCIs
Your bank failed to indemnify SCB for losses and/or liabilities that may arise from the use of the CCIs you transferred to SCB in violation of the provisions of the Foreign Exchange Manual 2006;
Your bank issued three CCIs outside the regulatory 24 hours without the approval of the CBN contrary to provisions of Memorandum 22 of the Foreign Exchange Manual 2006; and
Your bank illegally remitted the sum of $352,222,358.39 on behalf of Standard Chartered Bank and Stanbic IBTC Bank in respect of the various CCIs issued to MTN Nigeria Communications Limited.
“The directors are resigning for varied personal reasons, which will include focusing on their priorities. Diamond Bank will update the market with any further development in due course,” a notice signed by Uzoma Uja, the company secretary, read.
S&P Global Ratings downgraded also downgraded the bank’s rating to CCC+/C from ‘B-/B’ and its Nigeria national scale ratings to ‘ngBB-/ngB’ from ‘ngBBB-/ngA-3.
Just before all these, and In October, Oluwaseyi Bickerseth, the bank’s chairman and three non-executive directors resigned. The company, through its Secretary, Uzoma Uja said in a statement that they left “to focus on their priorities”
