Stanley Amuchie, executive director (ED), chief Operations and Information officer, Fidelity Bank Plc, in this interview with a select journalists, spoke on the bank’s activities in market public offers as banks and other financial institutions in the country are retooling their strategies in line with the reforms and policies of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). He also spoke on the position of Fidelity Bank in relations to the Small and Medium Enterprises, recapitalisation, acquisition/mergers, among other issues. Saby Elemba, who was at the session brings the excerpts:

What does the recognition of Fidelity Bank by the Independent Project Monitoring Company (IPMC) show. Does it show that you are doing well in environmental, social and governance (ESG)?

Yes, definitely we are doing a lot. Today, we are one of the banks in Nigeria that have taken ESG to a greater level. We are doing a lot on the environment, staff (socials) and corporate governance. Therefore, if you talk about governance board, of course, ours is recognised as one of the strongest boards in the banking industry in Nigeria.

We have people from different facets of the economy- oil and gas, investment, banking and others. Then talk about environment, we are doing paperless offices, green financing, and all. These are the things they have seen and that’s why they recognised us. This time in the financial sector is the signing ceremony and we are counting down to recapitalisation.

Could you let us know where you are ahead of the recapitalisation?

Thank you very much. You will recall that the Central Bank of Nigeria, on the 28th of March 2024, announced recapitalisation for the banking industry. If you look at Fidelity Bank, we got the approval of our shareholders on the 11th of August 2023. That shows that, as a bank, we understand our business as well as environment. Based on that, therefore, we went to seek approval of our shareholders to raise capital.

And what we are trying to do is to issue 10 billion units of shares in public offering at N9.75k per share, and 3.2 billion units of shares by way of right of issue to existing shareholders at N9.25k per share. That process has been in play. The signing ceremony is a step towards opening to the market. And that was why on the 5th of June, we had the signing ceremony; of course, the processes involved getting all the parties together.

Who are these parties?

The parties will be the people at the issuing houses, the banks, the reporting accountants and then, the stockbrokers. Those are the people that will make up the parties to the offer. We have gone through the processes of getting all the people together, as well as prepared documents for the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for approval. We have also secured approval of the Nigeria Stock Exchange Commission (NSEC) and that of the Nigeria Exchange Limited (NGX) and then held the sign in ceremony. The next step is to secure the final approval of SEC to open the offer to the market. And we opened the offer on 20th of June, this year. It will be open for 28 working days. What it means is that, we will close on the 29th of July.

It looks like you want to go into the market before others and ensure you get your shares before the competition gets stiff?

Like I said, we started this process earlier because ours is based on strategy. This is because we are looking at our current business. We believe we had enough capital to do our business but we are looking at the growth, which is why we are projecting growth. We believe that if you want to grow, you must have what it takes. I want to liken capital to what oxygen is to human beings. If you don’t have enough oxygen, you will suffocate. Therefore, we looked at the growth process and what we needed to do, hence we started ours quite early.

Even before the announcement?

Sure, we didn’t wait. Remember we were reacting to CBN’s pronouncement. We have been very proactive about our capital base, that’s what we are doing.

But you know there have been some jitters, maybe not so much when news about revocation of Heritage Bank’s license came on. We saw banking stocks drop and utilisation seemed like people were asking questions again, ‘what’s going on? Can I really invest in this? Is my money safe?’ And now you went to the market in this month of June. How do you convince the people that Fidelity Bank is safe?

Let me say this again, Fidelity Bank plc is safe. This is a bank that has shown capacity and growth over the years. For instance, in the last five years, if you look at the stock which is what we are talking about, you will appreciate the value our bank has created between May 2019 and May 2024. The value or share price Fidelity has grown by 507 percent or at N1.68k as at 31st of May 2019 to N10.20k as at 31st May 2024, that’s 507 percent growth. What this means is that, we have grown at an average of over 100 percent for every year.

You hit new record high, over 100 and 4000 for the all-share index?

Yes, for all that has happened, you will see that our bank grew more than two times that all share index.

Even if you talk about the banking index which is what track the value of shares of the banking industry, our bank did four times.

With this level of confidence, obviously you are not having any conversation about mergers, maybe you could acquire some banks?

Everything is on the table. For now, what we are trying to do, is to get additional capital at the level where we are today. And by the time we get that, we will be in a very good position to look at what is ahead of us.

Perhaps, you can acquire banks that need help, and it will increase your branches and assets?

Those are very possible. Like I said, everything is on the table for us. Our plan is to put ourselves in that position where you can think clearly and then be able to take any decision. And if we need to acquire, there has to be value. We will look at those who will bring that synergy we will need, that is what we are looking at. But aside that, we are well positioned.

You went to the market before the recapitalisation announcement, what is your major drive for that capital you are looking for?

When you are in business, at every point in your business, you need to sit back and look at where you are going to. We have seen at a lot of growth in Fidelity in the last three to five years in almost all the indices. If you look at the indices like gross earnings, we have seen growth from N206 billion in 2020 to N556 billion in 2023 on gross earnings. That’s cumulative average growth rate of 64 percent. More so, savings account and deposits have grown significantly.

So, almost all the performance indices have been on trajectory of growth. Therefore, you appreciate the kind of businesses you are seeing on the horizon at this moment. In this regard, what we have done, essentially, is to look at the Capital Needs Assessment, because we are getting more businesses, which is why we need to increase our capital to be able to take on more businesses so that we don’t get businesses we cannot handle. And like I said, capital in business is like what oxygen is to human being.

Small business owners do say that commercial banks are not their friend at all. Do you think this new capital will get to small businesses?

For Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), our bank has won several awards for SME’s support and there are probably, few banks, if any, that has supported SMEs, the way Fidelity has done. Our bank is more like an SMEs bank. We have grown new champions in the market and that’s what we are known for. I can assure you that we will continue to do that, even better in the years ahead.