Republic Bank acquires control over HFC Bank

HFC Bank Ghana Ltd is now a subsidiary of Republic Bank of Trinidad and Tobago which now holds a controlling 57.11 per cent in the local bank.

This follows Republic Bank’s successful Mandatory Takeover Offer (MTO) to the shareholders of HFC Bank (Ghana), after the Trinidadian bank – which acquired an eight per cent interest in HFC bank as strategic investor, crossed the 30 per cent shareholding mark to trigger a bid to take over the local bank, which has been neck-deep in housing and mortgage financing. 

The Managing Director of Republic Bank Limited, Mr David Dulal-Whiteway, in a statement thanked all stakeholders and well-wishers for their support. 

“We respect and honour the founders, staff and customers of HFC Bank who have made it what it is now and we look forward to steering HFC Bank toward becoming one of the leading banks in the country.” he said.

Mr Dulal-Whiteway told the Daily Graphic a fortnight ago that the bank would grow HFC Bank into one of the top five largest banks in the country and use Ghana as its hub to grow into English-speaking countries in Africa.

“I want to say there will be no job losses because our business model is to grow HFC Bank to be among the top five banks in the country within the shortest possible time. We want to consolidate HFC Bank and make it bigger. This strategy will rather create opportunity for more staff,” he stated. 

Republic Bank is the largest and most successful independent commercial bank in the English-speaking Caribbean. For 176 years, it has served retail-banking customers, corporate clients and governments throughout the region. 

HFC Bank now becomes the fifth banking subsidiary of the Republic Bank Group which has over 4,300 employees in 71 branches in Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, Guyana, the Cayman Islands and Barbados, the bank boasts of assets base of US$9.4 billion, with equity at US$1.4 billion as of September 30, 2014.   

Dulal-Whiteway added that in keeping with its philosophy, it would maintain strong local participation in its operations at HFC Bank.  

“We will promote strong local ownership, ensuring that there is strong local input, strong local content and knowledge, and strong local influence in decision making, as we continue to think like a global bank, working with international best practice.” 

He thanked individual and institutional shareholders of HFC Bank for the confidence they had shown in Republic Bank, adding that Republic Bank now had the mandate to partner with HFC in introducing innovations and modern trends into HFC Bank.

The takeover has run a long tortuous journey of more than a year, including clearing a legal hurdle that went through a High Court and Supreme Court, before it was cleared to issue the MTO under the ‘Takeover Code’ of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

The process has also seen a number of resignations in recent times, the latest being the former Managing Director, Mr Asare Akuffo, and the Board Chairperson, Mrs Muriel Edusei and another executive director.

At the last annual general meeting of HFC Bank, Professor Joshua Alabi was appointed board chairman. The new board at their first meeting also appointed Mr Robert Le Hunte as managing director.

Know this

Republic Bank Ltd was introduced to HFC Bank by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), which also provided some equity and technical assistance in setting up the Home Finance Company, which later became a universal bank with the name HFC Bank.

RBL first acquired eight per cent stake in the local bank, before grabbing other opportunities to up its stake to 40 per cent. Although the shareholder crossed the 30 per cent limit that could trigger a takeover long ago, it decided to waive its right to a Mandatory Takeover Offer (MTO) until after a year, which it is now exercising.