Type Private Products Banks Number of employees 883 (2013) | Industry Banking, Finance Founded 1962 | |
Headquarters Upper Hill, Nairobi, Kenya Key people Desterio Oyatsi
Group Chairman
Isaac Awuondo
Group CEO Revenue KSH 10.25 Billion (2013) Profiles | ||
Commercial Bank of Africa Group (CBA Group) is a financial services provider in East Africa. Its headquarters are located in Nairobi, Kenya, with subsidiaries in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.
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Location
The Group's headquarters are located in Nairobi, Kenya, with subsidiaries in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The flagship company of the group is Commercial Bank of Africa, with headquarters in Upper Hill, an upscale suburb of Nairobi, Kenya's capital and largest city.
Overview
The CBA Group is a large financial services group in East Africa, with an asset base estimated at almost US$1 billion, with shareholders' equity of approximately US$100 million.
History
Commercial Bank of Africa was established in 1962 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania as a subsidiary of Swiss-based Societe Financiere pour les pays D’Outre Mer (SFOM). The SFOM consortium included BanqueNationale de Paris, Bank Bruxelles Lambert, Commerz Bank and Bank of America. Branches of the bank were established in Nairobi and Mombasa, Kenya. Another branch was opened in Kampala, Uganda.
In 1967, the Government of Tanzania nationalized all commercial banks in the country as part of the government's nationalization of large industries in its execution of the Arusha Declaration. This nationalization led the bank to move its headquarters to Nairobi. In 1971, the Ugandan business was sold off to Barclays Bank of Uganda. This was due to the then prevailing political instability in the country.
BOA gained majority control of CBA in 1981 after BOA acquired shares held by other shareholders in the bank except for 16% that was held by local shareholder. Between 1984 and 1991, BOA re-organised CBA, developing and installing Bank of America`s global systems and disciplines before selling its majority shares to local Kenyan investors. Bank of America continued to provide management to the bank via a management agreement before eventually selling the rest of its shares in 1991. Since then, CBA became a wholly owned Kenyan bank recognised for operational efficiency and quality service delivery.
In July 2005, Commercial Bank of Africa (CBA) acquired majority shareholding in First American Bank of Kenya. At that time First American owned a subsidiary in Tanzania called United Bank of Africa. This marked the bank's reentry into Tanzania after the 1967 nationalization of its operations in the country. In 2007, United Bank of Africa changed its name to Commercial Bank of Africa (Tanzania) leading to the formation of the CBA Group.
In March 2012, CBA Group initiated action to acquire a 62% stake in Royal Bank Zimbabwe, a Harare-based commercial bank. However, both parties failed to finalize on the deal within given regulatory time frames. On July 31, 2012, The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe determined Royal Bank to be insolvent. Royal Bank then surrendered its banking licence and closed down.
CBA Group reentered the Ugandan market in 2014 through its wholly owned subsidiary, Commercial Bank of Africa Uganda Limited making it the 26th commercial bank in the Uganda.
Member Companies
The companies that compose the CBA Group include:
Ownership
The stock of Commercial Bank of Africa Group is privately held. As of June 2014, the largest shareholders in the Group's stock are depicted in the table below:
Governance
The Chairman of the board of directors is Desterio Oyatsi, one of the non-executive directors. Isaac Awuondo serves as the Group CEO.