Author: Muindi

Co-operative Bank of Kenya opened 2026 with its strongest quarterly performance on record, posting a net profit of Sh8.41 billion for the three months ended 31 March 2026, a 21.3 per cent jump from Sh6.93 billion in the same period a year earlier. The results, approved by the Board of Directors on 13 May 2026, cut through a difficult economic environment where many Kenyan businesses have struggled with rising costs and shrinking margins. What Drove the Growth Total operating income for the Group climbed 13.6 per cent to Sh24.05 billion, anchored by stronger lending activity and a meaningful contribution from…

United Bank for Africa (UBA) took a prominent seat at the Africa Forward Summit 2026 in Nairobi, using the platform to advance its vision of a continent built on enterprise, trade and purposeful global partnerships. The summit, themed “Africa–France Partnerships for Innovation and Growth” and co-hosted by Kenyan President William Ruto and French President Emmanuel Macron on 11 and 12 May 2026, drew approximately 30 African heads of state, more than 3,000 delegates, investors and business leaders from across Africa and Europe. Macron used the occasion to announce €23 billion ($27 billion) in combined investment commitments directed at energy transition,…

Consolidated Bank of Kenya faces a capital crisis that a KSh1.125 billion National Treasury bailout will not fully resolve. The state-owned lender closed December 2025 with a negative core capital position of KSh546 million, meaning its liabilities exceeded its assets before a single new regulatory requirement came into force. Then the Central Bank of Kenya raised the minimum capital threshold to KSh3 billion, effective 1 January 2026. That single adjustment widened the bank’s capital shortfall to at least KSh3.546 billion. The Treasury injection covers barely a third of that gap. A plan that raises more questions than it answers To…

France is rewriting its Africa strategy, one summit at a time. Accused of neo-colonial meddling across the continent where it once held decisive influence, Paris chose Nairobi — an English-speaking capital well outside its traditional orbit — to co-host the Africa Forward Summit, a deliberate signal that the old rules no longer apply. Speaking in the Kenyan capital on Tuesday, French President Emmanuel Macron repeatedly reached for the language of reciprocity, invoking “co-investment” and “equal footing partnerships” as he addressed pressures that leaders on both sides of the relationship know all too well: regional insecurity, economic dependence and intensifying competition…

A group of minority shareholders controlling 13.59% of WPP Scangroup has formally requisitioned a general meeting to remove the company’s board of directors, citing five years of financial deterioration, client losses and what they describe as a failure of governance at one of East Africa’s largest marketing and communications groups. The requisition, dated 7 and 8 May 2026 and addressed to the Chairman of WPP Scangroup’s Board of Directors, carries the signatures of eight shareholders led by former Chief Executive Bharat Kumar Thakrar and his wife Sadhana Thakrar, who together hold 45,302,860 shares representing 10.48% of the company’s issued share…

Aliko Dangote is structuring a dedicated investment vehicle in Kenya that will give investors direct access to the Dangote Group before the planned pan-African initial public offering of his petroleum refinery. All returns will be paid in US dollars. The World Bank Group has committed to supporting what Dangote describes as the continent’s largest industrial ownership programme. Dangote disclosed the Kenya structure during a conversation with IFC President Makhtar Diop, identifying the country as a specific investor entry point separate from the secondary NSE listing first reported by Bloomberg in April. The vehicle forms part of a broader ownership restructuring…