Renaissance Capital records $41m profit, to expand emerging market operations

THE emerging and frontier markets investment bank- Renaissance Capital, said it doubled its net profit from core business in 2014, to $40.5 million (about N8.2 billion) from $19.2 million (about N3.8 billion) in 2013.

In 2014, the bank recorded strong revenues from core business and continued reduction of cost base, which represented a 17.5 per cent decrease.

Recently, Renaissance Capital acted as advisor on the IPO of Nigeria’s SEPLAT through a dual listing on the London and Nigeria Stock Exchanges, the IPO of Georgia’s TBC Bank, sale of Orkla Brands Russia.

It also acted as adviser on other range of complicated and important transactions in emerging and frontier markets like the Do & CO placement on the Istanbul Stock Exchange, as well as the IPO of Rhodes Food Group on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange and the IPO of Nairobi Securities Exchange, among others.

The Chief Executive Officer of Renaissance Capital, Igor Vayn, said: “Amidst the challenging market conditions in 2014, we not only maintained leading position across the product offerings and regions of focus, but also exceeded the expectations of profit, doubling it year-on-year.

“As global institutional investors are shifting their focus to frontier markets, we believe these represent the catalyst for the company’s franchise growth.

“The combination of our world-class team and on-the-ground capabilities in the world’s most exciting markets are a winning formula for our goal of providing investors with best-in-class research, trading, banking and access to capital.”

According to the company’s report, total operating expenses fell to $197.1 million in 2014, from $238.8 million in 2013, while total operating income reached $250 million.

The company’s balance sheet remained strong with its equity-to-assets ratio at 14.2 per cent, compared with 13.5 per cent at the end of 2013, while total assets and equity stood at $3.31 billion and $468.6 million, respectively.

In 2014, Renaissance Capital also showed commitment to its core regions of Sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Europe, Russia/the CIS and Turkey, as it further focused on growing its market-leading frontier and emerging markets offering.

It opened an office in Dubai, United Arab Emirates and launched trading in other the Middle East markets like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Morocco, Oman and Tunisia.