Africap Offloads 15M Equity Shares after 5 Years

5 year period
The expiry of the 5 year lock in period where initial shareholders of the company (This was placed on ther principle shareholders of the company when the bank wenbt public in 2006).The principle shareholders were not to sell their shares until after August 2008 when the period would expire for Equity. The expiry of this period saw the opening of a window of opportunity for Africap to offload its shares though three months latter in December.

Shares
The firm sold the shares for Sh2.5 billion, reaping one of the highest returns from equity investment in Kenya over a five-year period. AfriCap was one of the seven large shareholders, who the Capital Markets Authority (CMA) had barred from selling Equity Bank shares before August, 2008.

Equity Shareholders
-Private Equity firm Helios EB held 24.23% of the bank’s shares by end of March 2008
-British American Investments-10.73%
-Dr. Mwangi-5.3%.
-Mr Nelson Njoroge 6%
-John Mwangi 4.58%
-Africap 4.02%
-Equity Bank’s Employee Share Ownership Plan (ESOPs)held 4.02 per cent.
-The rest of the shareholders in the bank had less than 2.93 per cent shares.

Benefits
Over the years Equity has split it shares, issued dividends and bonuses and continued to post strong profit margins alongside receiving major local as well as global awards in microfinance as well as innovative banking.

Expansion
In Kenya the Company continues to expand its customer base, branch network and ATM machines to serve a wider clientele Recently the company enterred into stock dealerships with the listing of Safaricom IPO alongside its insurance products and real estate development loans available to its clients. The company also acquired 24.9% of Housing Finance successfully enterring into the housing and property development market.
Equity Bank closed 2008 as the only stock at the NSE to post positive returns oscillating between Ksh 155 and 176 by end of December 2008.

Financial supermarket
Equity is endeavoring to become a financial supermarket of sorts with its diverse poducts lines and synergetic engagements but more still needs to be done to harnsaess these opportunities for the betterment of its services.

Parting shot!
Apart from long ATM queues amidst continually broken down ATM machines, hectic banking hall escapades, Overworked staff, and seemingly swelling cleintele base that may not be sufficiently served by the bank, Equity still rocks and its shares are set to go places in 2009!