Banque Marocaine du Commerce Extérieur At the time of
Moroccan independence, the new country's banking system was dominated by French banks, namely the
Banque Commerciale du Maroc controlled by
Crédit Industriel et Commercial and the local operations of
Banque Nationale pour le Commerce et l'Industrie,
Crédit Lyonnais, and
Société Générale as well as
Algeria-centric
Compagnie Algérienne and
Crédit Foncier d'Algérie et de Tunisie (CFAT). The creation of BMCE in 1959 was the first step in a decades-long process, known locally as
marocanisation, of reduction of that colonial legacy. BMCE was established in 1959 as a government-owned commercial entity and in 1962 opened its capital to foreign strategic investors, the main one being
Banca Commerciale Italiana (BCI) which had been present in Morocco since 1928 and brought BMCE its network of branches in the country. By late 1962, the foreign shareholders included BCI (16.7 percent), Mouton Roger Group (12.5 percent),
Banco di Roma,
Bank of America,
Bank of West Africa (BWA),
Banque Française du Commerce Extérieur,
Commerzbank, and
Skandinaviska Banken (2.8 percent each); private Moroccan shareholders held an additional 4.2 percent, while the Moroccan government retained 50 percent. In 1965 BWA, acquired that year by
Standard Bank, transferred to BMCE its branch in
Tangier. In 1971, BMCE took over the bulk of the
Société de Banque du Maghreb (SBM), the Moroccan subsidiary of the former CFAT, while
Société Générale Morocco acquired about a fifth of the SBM's activity. BMCE then opened its first overseas branch in
Paris in 1972, and in 1989 opened BMCE International in
Madrid, which in 1993 became part of a fully-fledged Spanish subsidiary. In 1989, it took a minority stake in the public development bank of
Mali, the first expansion of a Moroccan bank into
sub-Saharan Africa. In 1995, it was privatized and taken over by Othman Benjelloun through his controlling ownership of insurer .
Bank of Africa Bank of Africa was established in late 1982, in
Bamako, Mali, by local businesspeople. It was formed to address the scarcity of banking services for local businesses and individuals, which was prevalent not only in Mali at that time, but across most of
Francophone West Africa. This initial effort was without any external financial backing. The initial success of BOA led to the group gradual expansion and reorganization away from its Malian origins. In 1988, African Financial Holdings (AFH) was established in
Luxembourg as a holding company for BOA Mali and operations to be added in other African countries. The objectives of AFH were to promote the establishment of banking subsidiaries across Africa, with local capital participation as a key component and to offer both management, technical support as well as equity participation in these new banking subsidiaries. To increase their capital base, AFH then took on new investors including
Proparco (an affiliate of the
French Development Agency), the
Netherlands Development Finance Company (FMO), and Paris-based
Natexis (later
Natixis). AFH / Bank of Africa Group expanded through a mix of internal growth and acquisitions, including: • 1994: Nigerian International Bank (NIB) in
Niamey,
Niger, established in 1989 • 1996: Banafrique in
Abidjan,
Côte d'Ivoire, est. 1980 • 1999: National Bank for Rural Development (Bankin'ny Tantsaha Mpamokatra - BTM) in
Antananarivo,
Madagascar, est. 1979 • 2004:
Banque Indosuez's branch in
Nairobi,
Kenya, est. 1981; the BOA's first expansion beyond
French-speaking Africa • 2006:
Allied Bank in
Kampala,
Uganda, est. 1985 as Sembule Investment Bank and renamed in 1996 • 2007:
Eurafrican Bank in
Dar es Salaam,
Tanzania, est. 1995 • 2008:
Banque de Crédit de Bujumbura in
Bujumbura,
Burundi, est. 1922 as a branch of
Banque du Congo Belge and renamed in 1964 • 2010:
Banque Indosuez Mer Rouge in
Djibouti, est. 1908 as a branch of the
Banque de l'Indochine • 2011:
AmalBank in
Accra,
Ghana, est. 1999 • 2015:
Agaseke Bank in
Kigali,
Rwanda, est. 2003 Meanwhile BOA established and grew operations of its own in
Benin (1990),
Burkina Faso (1998),
Senegal (2001), the
Democratic Republic of the Congo (2010),
Togo (2013), and
Ethiopia (2014). In 2004, in partnership with the local government, it also created a specialized mortgage bank in
Cotonou, the ''Banque de l'Habitat du Benin'' (BHB), which however did not develop as significantly as initially envisaged. In 2010, BOA opened a subsidiary in France, developing from an earlier representative office opened in
Paris in 2000.
Merger and aftermath In 2008, Luxembourg-based AFH, the parent company of the Bank of Africa Group, rebranded itself into Bank of Africa Group S.A., and BMCE took a 35% shareholding interest, bringing financial capital and banking expertise. BMCE became majority owner of the BOA group in 2010, and held a 72.6 percent equity stake by 2013. Through successive transactions since 2004,
Crédit Mutuel Alliance Fédérale has become the second major shareholder of the group with 25% of the company's equity as of end-2020. The largest shareholder remains Othman Benjelloun at 27.4 percent, through his O Capital holding company and insurance company RMA Watanya. ==Operations==