Dipo Olowookere
By Dipo Olowookere
In order to incorporate efficiencies around operations and financing efforts, Sterling Bank Plc has said it is restructuring its business towards a holding structure.
In a notice to the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) on Monday, the lender said this new structure will allow it to begin its non-interest banking, which is also referred to as Islamic banking.
Already, the financial institution has obtained approval in principle of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to operate as a holding company.
The bank said under the new strategy, its non-interest bank and other non-core businesses will yield better results, while an improved efficiency will be experienced, while there would be better access to capital by leveraging the consolidated financial strength of the group which would have been otherwise difficult for each individual subsidiary company.
Sterling Bank, which said it was currently in the process of meeting the conditions for the final CBN approval, explained that the Holdco is designed to operate on three major premises; specialisation, partnership and digitisation.
“The holding company gives us the structure to explore our business model further,” the lender said, noting that the “desire is to entrench our business model premised on social capitalism where we believe that private sector capital and market-based tools will offer the best types of solutions to Nigeria’s most pressing social and environmental challenges.”
Business Post observed that in the past few trading sessions on the exchange, there have been huge activities around shares of Sterling Bank. The company had been very active as huge volumes of its stocks are transacted at the market, raising speculations about something cooking in the organisation.
At the close of trading on Monday, though it did not close as the most traded stock, it was in the second position with over 70 million units transacted during the session. The equity price closed 2.59 per cent or 3 kobo higher to N11.19 per share.
