Tony Elumelu

Institutional and High networth Investors in Nigeria have been urged to buy into the ongoing UBA Hybrid offer to enable them derive valuable returns from one of Africa’s fastedt growing financial institution, the United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc.

Addressing a cross section of investors in Lagos recently, Mr. Tony Elumelu, Group Managing Director, UBA Plc, said that the vision of the Bank transcends Nigeria, explaining that the bank is looking at being the undisputed industry leader in the continent of Africa, a factor that is driving the ongoing offer in the market.

Taking the audience through the Bank’s road map to leadership of the African financial services landscape, Mr. Elumelu highlighted the three pronged growth strategy of the bank, saying UBA first envisioned the dominance of the Nigerian market, a target that had already been met based on the current rating of the bank as the largest bank in Nigeria.

Continuing, he said the bank also took upon the challenge of transforming into a leading West African and indeed African bank and finally growing to become a Global bank doing business with a distinctively African bias.

While the second stage of the roadmap, according to GMD started with the bank’s establishment of business presence in Ghana, he informed the select audience of other plans to have presence in various other African countries before the end of the 2007.

Commenting on the Mr. Elumelu’s presentation, Mr. J.K. Randle, former Managing Partner, KPMG praised the management of the UBA for their outstanding achievement, especially on the feat of becoming the first Nigerian and West African bank to record a balance sheet size of over N1 trillion.

This achievement Mr. Randle noted, demonstrates the commitment of UBA to be a leading player with potential to reward shareholder value.

The Investors Forum, organised by UBA Global Markets had in attendance, top executives from Merrill Lynch, led by Marcus Heilner, Managing. Others in attendance include; Mr. Sonnie Ayere, Managing Director, Global Markets as well as Mr. Olawale Edun, Former Commissioner of Finance, Lagos State among others.