LAGOS, July 18 (Reuters) - Nigeria's central bank has extended guarantees to Skye Bank for another year while it considers the bank's recapitalisation proposal, the mid-tier lender said in a statement.

The central bank shored up the Skye last year with a 100 billion naira ($328 million) capital injection, after sacking its top management for failing to meet minimum capital requirements. It then appointed a new management team.

The bank said it had recovered 60 billion naira in bad loans, closed some branches and sold four subsidiaries to boost capital in the past year.

Skye's problems started after it used short-term funds to buy local lender Mainstreet Bank in 2014 but failed to raise fresh cash. It was in talks with shareholders and investors last year to raise 30 billion naira but suspended the plans when weak oil prices hit capital markets and drove foreign investors away.

"The bank continues to require assistance from central bank and government as it repairs the damage inflicted on the institution in the past and charts a sustainable path forward for the bank," Skye bank said in a statement.

It said it had reached restructuring agreements with many of the chronic bad debtors resulting in improved payments and prospects of future recoveries, it said in a statement.

Skye shares rose more than 3 percent on Tuesday and were up 16 percent this year, after last year's 68 percent plunge.

The bank, which posted a pre-tax loss in 2015, said it had submitted its 2016 accounts for approval.

The central bank designated Skye as one of Nigeria's systemically important banks due to the size of total deposits it holds after it acquired Mainstreet Bank. This means it has to increase its capital ratio to 16 percent, the industry average.

The bank said it has appointed advisers to guide it on a recapitalisation process and that it has identified various options with proposals being considered by the central bank.

danidee10:


I don't know about music.

But a lot of Americans act their movies in 'good' African countries.

Captain America (Civil war)
Blended
Blood diamond (This one was even shot in Mozambique)

These are just few examples

Have you asked yourself why these guys never shoot their movies in Nigeria?

Explorers:



Thanks, o to jo meta.

Been a while, hw u doin bro?

Ishilove:

As in ehn

davide470:
How can we apply?

majekdom2:
Whilst they are begging people to come work in NZ.

phemocheee:
This Op sef.

So you expect to get a honest answer to this question right? The truth is if I tell you I will be able to afford a particular car, you will most likely divide the car's value by 12 and automatically know how much I earn monthly

So the question is: Why do you need to know my monthly salary and what kind of fun is this?

Na from info like this village people dey take follow person up and down.

Angelb4:
The only declare Nigerians want to hear is public holiday.

Antibacterial soaps and gels are useless and may cause harm, 200 scientists and medics have warned.

The consensus statement, published in the scientific journal Environmental Health Perspectives also cautions against the use of antimicrobial agents in food storage containers, exercise mats and paints.

Environmental health professors said “plain soap and water” was the best way to protect against illness.

But they also said antibacterial products – some of which have been banned in the United States, and are being phased out here – could cause harm to some consumers, especially pregnant women and those breastfeeding.

Environmental health professor at the University of San Francisco, United States (U.S.), Dr. Barbara Sattler said: “People think antimicrobial hand soaps offer better protection against illness, but generally, antimicrobial soaps perform no better than plain soap and water.”

Late last year, America banned 19 different antimicrobial chemicals, including triclosan and triclocarban, saying they were not effective and should not be marketed for use in over-the-counter consumer wash products.

However scientists fear they have merely been replaced with ones that are even worse.

British firms such as Unilever say they are phasing the two chemicals out of their products by the end of this year,adding they will be replaced by “a range of alternatives, including natural and nature-inspired antibacterial ingredients”.

Dr. Arlene Blum, Executive Director of Green Science Policy Institute said: “I was happy that the FDA (US Food and Drug Administration) finally acted to remove these chemicals from soaps.

“But I was dismayed to discover at my local drugstore that most products now contain substitutes that may be worse.

“Antimicrobials are also commonplace in products where you wouldn’t expect them, including paints, exercise mats, flooring, apparel, food storage containers, home textiles, electronics, kitchenware, school supplies, and countertops.”

Dr. Ted Schettler, Science Director of the Science and Environmental Health Network, said: “Customers may think added antimicrobials are a way to reduce infections, but in most products there is no evidence that they do.”

Dr. Rolf Halden, Professor of engineering at Arizona State University added: “Environmental and human exposures to triclosan and triclocarban are widespread, affecting pregnant women, developing foetuses, and breast-feeding babies.

“We must develop better alternatives and prevent unneeded exposures to antimicrobial chemicals.”

In June a US study found hot water is no better than cold at getting rid of germs.

They discovered washing in cool water removes just as many germs as hot water.

The study by Rutgers University in New Jersey also found antibacterial soap was no better than normal soap.

Atlas Mara Ltd, the African investment vehicle of former Barclays boss Bob Diamond, said on Wednesday that it plans to raise $200 million to increase its stake in Union Bank of Nigeria and to scale up other businesses.

Atlas Mara said it was buying a 13.4 percent stake in the Union Bank of Nigeria from Clermont Group, taking its total holding to 44.5 percent.

The bank said it is in discussions with potential investors regarding a possible raising of new equity capital, comprising of $100 million equity offering and a $100 million mandatory convertible bond.

Diamond teamed up with Africa-based entrepreneur Ashish Thakkar to set up Atlas Mara, a vehicle through which they planned to buy up assets to help build it into a powerful force in African banking. (Reporting By Andrew MacAskill; Editing by Rachel Armstrong)

tolugar:
They shld pls write this guys story as a novel


Am tired of reading bit by bit

The divide between the haves and the have-nots among Nigerian banks is widening, a report by Bloomberg has indicated.
The country’s biggest lender by market capitalisation, Guaranty Trust Bank Plc, is so flush with cash it plans to repay its $400 million of bonds when they become due in November 2018 rather than issuing additional debt, while the Zenith Bank Plc and United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc – the next largest banks by market capitalisation – sold international bonds for the first time since 2014.

At the other end of the scale, smaller lenders are scrapping plans to raise dollar loans and struggling to find investors to raise capital.
Tier 1 banks in Africa’s most-populous nation and biggest oil producer are rallying after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in April opened a foreign exchange trading window for investors and exporters, easing a crippling currency shortage that contributed to the worst economic contraction in 25 years.

Smaller banks are lagging behind as they battle rising levels of non-performing loans (NPLs) and capital buffers near regulatory minimums.

“The gap between the Tier 1 and Tier 2 banks has been widening in profitability and balance-sheet size,” said Omotola Abimbola, an analyst at Afrinvest West Africa Ltd.

“In the next one or two years we will probably see the trend extending further.”
UBA, the third-biggest lender by market value, raised $500 million in its first Eurobond sale on June 1 at yields below initial guidance.
This followed an equivalent issue a week earlier by Zenith Bank in a deal that was four times oversubscribed.

GTBank said this month it has no plans to sell Eurobonds because it’s setting aside funds to repay existing debt.
By contrast, small- and mid-sized lenders like Wema Bank Plc dropped plans last month to raise dollar loans to rather sell naira debt locally in smaller tranches.

Unity Bank Plc, which missed a February 28 central bank deadline to recapitalise, has been in talks with investors since October, while Diamond Bank Plc started negotiations to sell businesses and issue debt over a year ago.
“We view the Tier 2 banks as potentially challenged,” Exotix Partners LLP analysts Jumai Mohammed and Ronak Gadhia said in a note last month. The lenders seem unable “to weather asset-quality deterioration storms”.

The central bank had to step in last year when it replaced the top management of Skye Bank Plc for breaching liquidity thresholds.
That’s still a far cry from the full-scale takeovers in 2009, when former central bank Governor Lamido Sanusi rescued 10 lenders and spent N1.8 trillion ($5.5 billion) to rescue banks that had been brought to their knees by souring loans and corrupt managers.
Still, the five-year dollar bonds didn’t come cheap. UBA settled on a coupon, or interest paid twice annually, of 7.75 per cent.

That’s the highest of at least 10 sales of $500 million by emerging-market banks this year from Turkey, Kuwait, Bahrain, South Korea and China. Zenith will pay 7.375 per cent, compared with 6.25 per cent on five-year notes sold in April 2014.

Even so, more lenders will issue Eurobonds because they need dollars to offer loans in the U.S. currency or to repay debt, said Lekan Olabode, an analyst at Vetiva Capital Management Ltd. in Lagos.
Ecobank Transnational Inc., based in Lome, Togo, plans to sell a $400 million, five-year convertible bond this month to refinance debt and provide short-term bridge funding for non-performing loans at its Nigerian unit.

Fidelity Bank Plc will decide in the third quarter whether to refinance $300 million of bonds due in May next year or issue new debt after seeing yields on the securities drop and strong demand from investors for Zenith and UBA’s notes, Chief Operations Officer Gbolahan Joshua said Tuesday. Access Bank Plc has $350 million of bonds due in July.
Some banks may use share-price gains to sell equity, although most trade at less than book value, making a rights offering expensive, Olabode said.

Local debt also comes at a price, with yields on five-year government bonds at 16.3 per cent.
The Nigerian Stock Exchange Banking (NSE) Index has advanced 44 per cent this year, with UBA soaring 99 per cent to its highest since January 2014, while Access Bank has climbed more than 80 per cent to a four-year high.

Wema has gained less than 2 per cent and Skye Bank and Union Bank of Nigeria Plc are up about 10 per cent in 2017.
Union Bank, in which former Barclays Plc Chief Executive Officer Bob Diamond’s Atlas Mara Ltd. owns 31 per cent, said in November it will sell as much as N50 billion in a rights issue scheduled to take place by the end of this quarter.

Sterling Bank, which announced plans to raise N65 billion in Tier 2 capital last July, managed to raise N7.9 billion in 2016 at 16.5 per cent, and is waiting for market conditions to improve before another issuance, according to Chief Financial Officer Abubakar Suleiman.

Without capital to back new business and write loans, small lenders risk falling further behind as Nigeria’s economy recovers from last year’s 1.6 per cent contraction.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has forecast Nigeria will expand 0.8 per cent in 2017 as oil price improves.

“Big banks have a pricing advantage,” said Vetiva’s Olabode. “That makes a big difference in size and capacity to do business,” he stated.
But even with the disparity between Tier 1 and Tier 2 banks in the country widening, there were indications Tuesday that confidence in the Nigerian FX market has been restored, with the cumulative transactions on the Investors’ & Exporters’ (I&E) segment of the market rising to $2.2 billion, from about $1 billion last month. Confirming this Tuesday, CBN spokesman, Mr. Isaac Okorafor, also disclosed that trading on the I&E window, has helped in boosting liquidity and ensured timely execution and settlement of eligible transactions.

The spokesman expressed confidence that interventions by the central bank would continue to guarantee stability in the market and ensure availability to individuals and business concerns. CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, in an exclusive interview with THISDAY at the weekend said the introduction of the I & E window had eliminated sharp practices in the market.

“Now, everything is done in the open and in a very transparent manner. If you want to sell your dollars, you offer the banks and the bank knowing that he has a buyer, matches you with the buyer and the bank makes only N1 spread.

“With the transparency that has been brought into that market, we have seen a lot of inflows into that market and rates began to converge…
“As much as possible, the central bank does not want to be seen to be having excessive control over the market. We can only come in based on our reading of the market, based on our understanding of what the exchange rate is, to come in to intervene as a player in the market,” Emefiele said.

Analysts believe that the increase in volume of transactions on the I&E segment is a positive sign of return of confidence in the financial markets as clearly demonstrated by the bull run on the stock market.

According to them, the investor sentiment has strengthened since the CBN introduced the I&E FX window, which they agreed has ensured greater flexibility in exchange rate determination. They, however, advised the CBN to continue its march towards the convergence of rates.
Meanwhile, the CBN said it injected another $418 million into various segments of the inter-bank Tuesday.

Figures obtained from the CBN indicated that the retail segment of the market received the highest intervention with $226 million, followed by the wholesale window that got $100 million. The Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) window received a boost of $50 million, while the retail invisibles segment was allocated $42 million to meet the demands of customers.

The CBN on Monday injected $413.5 million into the interbank market in its unrelenting bid to guarantee liquidity in the market and shore up the value of the naira. The naira remained stable at N363/$1 on the parallel market Tuesday.