This is exclusive information from our colleagues at Jeune Afrique business + who announces that Simon Tiemtoré, boss of Lilium Capital has reached an agreement with the French banking group for the takeover of the Burkinabe and Guinean subsidiaries. 

Put up for sale since May 2019, the African subsidiaries of the French group have now found a buyer. Five months after the acquisition by the financial group of the Ivorian Dossongui Koné of BNP's stake in BICIM (International Bank for Trade and Industry of Mali), those of Burkina Faso and Guinea have just fallen in turn into the lap of the banking group of the American-Burkinabe, Simon Tiemtoré.

"I had the good news of Mr. Tiemtoré's signing of the agreement for the takeover of our subsidiaries in Burkina Faso and Guinea. We all wish him every success," a senior official at the French banking group told Jeune Afrique Business+. The agreement provides for the sale of 51% of BICIAB's capital and 55% of BICIGUI to Lilium capital, a holding company that controls Vista bank, present in Guinea and Sierra Leone and The Gambia.

 
However, the amount of the transaction remains confidential. After Coris Bank international of the emblematic banker Idrissa Nassa, IB Bank of the Burkinabe king of construction, Mahamadou Bonkoungou and Wendkuni international bank of the tycoon of telecoms, Apollinaire Compaoré, Simon Tiemtoré becomes the fourth Burkinabe to embark on a regional banking adventure. 

The arrival of Vista bank is part of the policy of Burkinabe President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré to make Ouagadougou a regional financial center.
 
Before this first acquisition in West Africa, Simon Tiemtoré was in negotiations with the Togolese authorities for the acquisition of the Togolese Bank for Trade and Industry. However, it remains in the running by the sale of the public financial institution as well as the Togolese Union of Banks (UTB).

The entry into the WAEMU zone reinforces Vista Bank's ambition to become a pan-African group and this acquisition now gives it the free field to break into this West African market dominated by Ecobank, the French group Societe Generale or the Burkinabe financial group Coris Bank.