Mucoba Bank has become the first upcountry bank to be listed on the Dar es Salaam Stock Exchange (DSE) after raising a capital of more than Sh2 billion during its initial public offering. (IPO)
The Mufindi-based lender, which started as a community bank, was listed on the DSE's main investment market segment yesterday.
The permanent secretary in the ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, Prof Adolf Mkenda, said the listing showed that even rural communities could be mobilised to raise huge amounts of capital.
Prof Mkenda said since Tanzania aspires to build an industrial economy, DSE can be used as a catalyst for spearheading the process.
"The listing of Mucoba Bank shows that when people are mobilised it is possible to raise capital for rapid industrialisation," he said.
At around 10:00 am yesterday, Prof Mkenda rang the bell for launch trading of Mucoba Bank at Sh250 per share at the main market segment, whereby it will be traded with a stock symbol of Mucoba.
Mucoba general manager Ben Mahenge said the bank, which had raised a capital of more than Sh800 million before the IPO, had been paying dividends to its shareholders for eight consecutive years.
According to him, the bank has 45,500 customers with total deposits of Sh14.3 billion.
DSE chief executive officer Moremi Marwa said the listing of Mucoba brings to 24 the number of businesses listed on the bourse.
Seventeen of the companies are local and the rest foreign.
Mr Marwa said out of 17 listed Tanzanian companies, 12 are in the main market segment and five are listed on the Enterprise Growth Market segment. "There is still a need to list more companies."
The founding chairman of Mucoba Bank, Mr Joseph Mungai, said the bank started 1998 with a capital of only Sh50 million.
Mucoba is located in Mufindi District -- a remote area in southern Tanzania -- about 700km from Dar es Salaam. Parts of Mufindi are fertile, but remote villages are sometimes inaccessible during the rainy season because roads are bad.
