This archive report was first published on 29 October 2019.
On October 29, 2019, Nigerian Tier one bank Access Bank announced its plans to acquire Retired President Daniel Moi's Transnational Bank after receiving approval from the Competition Authority of Kenya (CAK).
Access Bank, owned by Nigerian Business Mogul Herbert Wigwe, will take up 93.57% ownership of Transnational, seven months after the Nigerian lender merged with Diamond Bank to create Africa's largest lender by customer base.
According to a statement by Access Bank, the bank's Board of Directors obtained the Central Bank of Nigeria's 'No Objection' to its proposed acquisition of controlling equity interest in Transnational Bank of Kenya Plc.
With 29 million customers and operations in 12 countries across three continents, Access Bank's acquisition of Transnational expands its presence in Kenya, where its Nigerian competitors Guaranty Trust Bank (GT) and United Bank of Africa (UBA) already operate.
The acquisition also aligns with the Central Bank of Kenya's (CBK) consolidation plan, which has seen large lenders merge in the recent past, including the Kenya Commercial Bank's (KCB) acquisition of the National Bank of Kenya and the merger of Commercial Bank of Africa (CBA) and NIC Bank to form NCBA.
Transnational Bank, one of the 44 banks licensed by CBK, reported a Ksh98.5 million loss in the Financial Year ended December 2018, with Non-performing Loans (NPLs) increasing from Ksh1.17 billion to Ksh1.85 billion in the same year.
