Return to Absa roots

STRATEGY REVAMPED: LENDER AIMS TO DOUBLE IN SIZE

Wants to create a consumer finance business across Africa.

Barclays Africa Group is going back to its roots. The bank plans to revert back to the Absa Group name, as it was known before Barclays Plc took control of the company in 2005. With the British bank’s stake now reduced to 14.9%, Barclays Africa is also embarking on a plan to double in size and capture at least 12% of banking revenues across Africa.

“We will stretch ourselves to develop the platform for double-digit growth and build momentum to accelerate delivery,” CEO Maria Ramos said yesterday. “This is a critical period in which we will need to complete our separation from Plc, build and scale new capabilities, and rebuild our organisational and cultural foundations to capture growth.”

The lender, which has operations in 12 African countries, is forging its own path after Barclays CEO Jes Staley opted to reduce the British bank’s presence on the continent in favour of a trimmeddown investment bank focused on London and New York.

With the split on track, Ramos said she would consider appropriate acquisitions to support the company’s growth plan, explore strategic partnerships and new markets, and use technology so the lender’s operations become fully digitised.

While Barclays Africa hasn’t set timelines for reaching the goals, it will seek to support the new strategy by: Creating a consumer finance business across Africa to fill a “rapidly growing need,” Ramos said. “We’re going to target this opportunity with our core middle and affluent customers and fully expect to grow our base here.” Building a payments hub. “Payments is a highly profitable area and is growing at 8% annually. Our payments hub needs to be simple and intuitive and work on a single platform across the continent. It also needs to be affordable.” Launch a transaction banking platform. “It’s going to account for two-thirds of our wholesale revenue in three years. It’s fee based and has low capital requirements. Again, we need it to work seamlessly with our corporate and small business propositions, providing great cash management and access to our trade finance products.”

The new strategy, which was pulled together after Ramos at the end of last year gathered more than 600 employees at an event over two days, will see Barclays Africa push to regain market share in SA retail, expand its corporate and investment banking business and integrate wealth and investment into businesses.

Dedicated resources

To drive the separation, Barclays Africa has about 360 people dedicating more than 70% of their time on the programme, which seeks to reach full deconsolidation by the first half of 2021, finance director Jason Quinn said. Shareholders will vote on the name change at the annual general meeting on May 15.

Barclays Africa said full-year earnings before one-time items rose 4% to R15.6 billion.

Its dividend increased by the same margin to R10.70, beating the R10.55 average of 11 analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg. – Bloomberg