Jul 2006 Financial News

NCB Capital Markets Plans to Go Public

Jul 04, 2006

All figures quoted in Jamaican Dollars

As reported by the Jamaica Observer on July 4, 2006, NCB Capital Markets (NCB), a wholly owned subsidiary of National Commercial Bank Jamaica (NCBJ), may be on the path to going public.

Yesterday, NCBJ informed the Jamaican Stock Exchange (JSE) of the plans of NCB to raise $300 million through a public offer of preference stock units in NCB Capital Markets.

In an interview with the Observer, Mr. Dennis Cohen, NCB’s Group Deputy Managing Director, said that the money raised would be used for general purposes in the Company’s core business. He also stated that this listing of preference shares was a likely precursor to going fully public, but did not give any time frame.

Currently, the financial performance of NCB is consolidated into the books of its parent company, NCBJ, under the Wealth Management segment- which is mainly made up of NCB Capital Markets and West Indies Trust Co Ltd. For the Half Year ended March 31, 2006- the segment reported an Operating Profit of $787 million and Operating Revenue of $3.8 billion, with Assets of $57 billion.

Once the subsidiary has a separate listing from NCBJ, the full financial results would be published separately and thus provide the public with greater information on the operations of the Company.

At this time, we are unable to comment on how this would impact the books of NCBJ and as such whether or not it would add to shareholder value.


Source: The Jamaican Observer

Gia Singh
WISE Research Team