Pan-African lender Ecobank Transnational has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to partner with India’s second-largest bank, ICICI, to make itself a hub for Indian investment into Africa, Ecobank’s CEO said on Monday. CEO Thierry Tanoh told the Reuters Africa Investment Summit that a similar alliance with South Africa’s Nedbank had helped it gain better access to markets in southern Africa.
« What we are trying to do is become the partner of choice when it comes to dealing with sub-Saharan Africa, » Mr Tanoh, who has headed up the bank since October last year, told the summit, adding that the MoU with ICICI had just been signed.
« The idea is to attract South-South (developing country) investors to go through our bank, in order to do business in sub-Saharan Africa. »
He said the bank was forecasting an increase in deposits of 20%, revenue growth of 15% and a fall in cost-income ratios into the low 70s for this year.
Ecobank, which has operations in 33 countries since opening a new branch in Equatorial Guinea, posted a record pretax profit of $348m for last year, an increase of 25% on the previous year, results released last month showed.
The Togo-headquartered bank grew its loan book to $10bn last year against $15bn in customer deposits and total assets of $20bn, the results showed.
Source: Business Day
