AMCON awaits Buhari’s govt for sale of Keystone Bank

Contrary to earlier plan to sell Keystone Bank Limited after the general elections, Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) now says it will wait for the administration of Muhammadu Buhari, president-elect, to come on board for it to do so.

Mustapha Chike-Obi, managing director/CEO, AMCON, who disclosed this while responding to BusinessDay inquiry, also said the corporation will need to get input from the new administration to sale the bank.

“We will wait till after the transition and get input from the new administration”, Chike-Obi said.

he corporation had planned to sell Keystone Bank Ltd., the biggest of three lenders nationalised after a 2009 financial crisis, in the second quarter after the general elections.

Chike-Obi had said the sale of the bridge bank will be transparent and AMCON will call for bids with a selection process lasting three to four months and ending this year.

Keystone is the last of three nationalised lenders to be sold after Mainstreet Bank was purchased by Skye Bank Plc and Enterprise Bank by Heritage Banking Co. last year. The corporation had sold Enterprise at a total of N56.1 billion to Heritage Bank while Skye Bank paid a total of N126.8 billion to purchase Mainstreet Bank last year.

AMCON was set up in 2010 to stabilise Nigeria’s banking industry and buy bad loans after a debt crisis in Africa’s biggest oil producer.

Keystone Bank is a full service commercial bank wholly owned by AMCON and was granted banking licence on August 5, 2011 by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). The bank has met and exceeded all capital and capital adequacy requirements of the CBN and assumed the deposit liabilities, certain other liabilities and assets of former Bank PHB Plc, following the revocation of the erstwhile bank’s operating licence by the apex bank.