Fitch, GCR Upgrade Wema Bank’s Rating, Confirm Position, Stable Outlook For The Bank – Independent Newspaper Nigeria

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 Further giving credence to its ca­pacity for long-term sustainabili­ty in the African banking ecosys­tem, credit rating agencies Fitch and GCR have both upgraded the ratings of Wema Bank, Nigeria’s oldest indigenous bank, most innovative bank and pioneer of Africa’s first fully digital bank, ALAT.

Raising the projection on Wema Bank’s outlook from Sta­ble to Positive, American rating agency, Fitch, upgraded the Bank’s National Long-Term Rat­ing to ‘A-(nga)’ from ‘BBB(nga)’, while affirming its Long-Term Issuer Default Rating (IDR) at ‘B-‘. African rating agency, GCR, also upgraded Wema Bank’s National scale long and short-term issuer rating to BBB+(NG)/A2(NG) from BBB(NG)/A3(NG); with Outlook, Stable.

Reputed for its tenacity and success in overcoming the vari­ous challenges that have shaped the banking industry for decades, Wema Bank has built an admira­ble legacy of impact, resilience, empowerment, innovation, dominance, transformation and excellence since 1945.

The Bank has pioneered a paradigm shift in banking, con­necting banking with lifestyle, leveraging innovation, and in­troducing a new era of impact­ful banking where customers’ needs are proactively met with practical solutions tailored to ev­ery stage of their lives. Beyond being Nigeria’s longest surviving indigenous bank, Wema Bank’s intentional approach to banking has arguably earned it the title of Nigeria’s most innovative bank—a legacy that continues to reflect in the Bank’s numbers.

From a steady increase in customer volume to diversity in customer-base, strategic variety in range of solutions to increased shareholder confidence and up­turns across several financial metrics, Wema Bank has prov­en to be the Bank that has not just built a legacy of 80 years of impact, but more significantly, the indigenous financial insti­tution with a future of limitless possibilities; one that will outlive expectations, transcend time and prove in the centuries to come, that Nigerian businesses can last. It comes as no surprise that credible ratings agencies, Fitch and GCR, have upgraded the Bank’s ratings and affirmed a positive and stable outlook for the Bank.

Commending Fitch and GCR for the objective assessment and projection of the Bank’s promis­ing future, Moruf Oseni, the MD/ CEO of Wema Bank, reiterated the Bank’s promise to its custom­ers and shareholders, asserting with confidence that Wema Bank’s journey has just begun at 80. According to him, “Wema Bank is more than just a provider of financial services. This great institution represents a bold and firm statement to the world, ‘Ni­gerian-owned can stand the test of time’. Wema Bank was found­ed on the precipice of catering to the needs of Nigerians when no one else would. 80 years later, that legacy lives on and we are more fueled than ever to keep that time­less legacy thriving”.