A number of minority shareholders constituting 22.38 per cent of National Bank’s ownership are yet to relinquish their shares for the offer made by KCB Group.
Although KCB were unable to comment on the exact number of small shareholders who are not yet on board, the lender yesterday announced 77.62 per cent of National Bank shareholders were on board with the ongoing share swap.
“What we need is to reach a 75 per cent threshold of new shareholders coming on board for us to announce the transaction as successful,” KCB managing director Joshua Oigara told the Star.
National Bank currently has 55,ooo small shareholders.
He said major shareholders and larger individual shareholders who account for 75.2 per cent of NBK had accepted the offer adding that KCB’s real target was to reach 90 per cent.
Oigara said that having talked to some of the remaining shareholders, the biggest issue arising was valuation of National Bank.
“We are paying Sh6 billion to the shareholders and are going to inject another Sh6 billion into NBK as capital and that’s what the valuation of the bank actually looks like,” he said.
In July, National Bank’s board reported that the lender had been undervalued by about 38 per cent in the proposed takeover.
The board, in an advisory circular to its shareholders, said the fair valuation is one KCB share for every 6.23 NBK.
KCB’s share swap offer which closes on Friday, provided that NBK shareholders trade in 10 of their shares for one KCB share. At yesterday’s closing bell at the Nairobi bourse a KCB share traded at Sh40.20 while one NBK share was trading at Sh3.75.
“As a consequence of the condition set by the shareholders of NBK, the ordinary shares to be issued pursuant to the conversion will not be in existence at the closing date,” KCB said in a statement.
Once the offer is closed, KCB expects suspension of NBK shares from trading at the Nairobi Securities Exchange to commence on September 2.
“We have offered to keep NBK running for the next two years rather than merging it into one entity,” Oigara said.
