IslamicFinance.de

The Nigerian Stock Exchange is set to list Nigeria’s first non-interest commercial bank, Jaiz Bank. The council of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) has approved the bank’s listing of its entire issued share capital on the exchange. Jaiz Bank will be listing a total of 29.46 billion ordinary shares of 50 kobo each at 1.25 naira, indicating a start-off market capitalisation of 36.83 billion naira. The bank has more than 20,000 shareholders, including shareholders such as the former Chairman of First Bank, Umaru Mutallab, industrialist Aminu Dantata, and development finance institution- Islamic Development Bank. The listing will be executed by way of an introduction, however, the company has indicated its interest in an Initial Public Offering.

The chairman of the Board of Directors of Jaiz Bank Plc, Umaru Mutallab, has charged the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and other regulatory authorities in the banking sector to urgently consider developing Sharia-compliant liquidity management instruments for non-interest Islamic banks to invest in. Moreover, the process needed to be expedited to create a level playing field for all the participants in the financial service sub-sector including micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) that so badly needed non-interest loans for their businesses, he added. Meanwhile a communiqué issued by Maidah Foundation, a network of Nigerian Muslim women entrepreneurs, prayed the federal government to strengthen the role of Islamic organisations in the creation of funds for the Nigerian entrepreneurs.