Bank of Africa Group


Bank of Africa Group, also known as Bank of Africa, is a multinational pan-African banking conglomerate with banking operations in eighteen African countries, and a representative office in Paris, France. Bank of Africa maintains its headquarters in Bamako, the capital of Mali.

Overview

BOA is a large financial services provider in eighteen sub-Saharan countries. As of December 2016, the group's total assets were valued at €7.8 billion In addition to its fourteen commercial banks, the group also includes a finance company, a housing bank, a leasing company, one brokerage firm and two investment firms, as well as a management company and a representative office in Paris.

History

The maiden bank of the BOA Group, BOA Mali, was established in late 1982, in Bamako, Mali, by local businesspeople. It was formed to address the scarcity of banking services for local businesses and individuals, which was prevalent not only in Mali at that time, but across most of Francophone West Africa. This initial effort was without any external financial backing.
The success of BOA Mali, led to the establishment of African Financial Holdings , as the holding company for BOA Mali in 1988. The objectives of AFH were to promote the establishment of banking subsidiaries across Africa, with local capital participation as a key component and to offer both management, technical support as well as equity participation in these new banking subsidiaries.
Starting in 1990 with BOA Benin, the group started opening subsidiaries across the continent, initially in Francophone countries but eventually in Anglophone Africa, starting with BOA Kenya in 2004. To increase their capital base, AFH took on new investors including the PROPARCO, a division of the French Development Agency, Netherlands Development Finance Company and Natexis of France.
In 2008, Banque Marocaine du Commerce Exterieur took a 35% shareholding interest in AFH, which had rebranded to Bank of Africa Group, bringing much needed financial capital and banking expertise to the group.

Member companies

Banking subsidiaries

BOA had operational bank subsidiaries in the following countries, as of March 2016:

Specialized subsidiaries

The specialized subsidiaries of Bank of Africa Group include the following:
  1. Banque de l'Habitat du Bénin
  2. Equipbail Benin
  3. Equipbail Mali
  4. Equipbail Mada
  5. Actibourse SA
  6. Agora SA
  7. Aissa - BOA's IT company
  8. Attica SA

    Ownership

As at March 2016, the stock of Bank of Africa Group is owned by the following corporate entities and individuals:
RankName of OwnerPercentage Ownership
1Banque Marocaine du Commerce Exterieur of Morocco72.70
2Private African investors16.09
3Netherlands Development Finance Company of the Netherlands5.02
4PROPARCO of France3.84
5 2.35
Total100.00