THE NEWLY-RESTRUCTURED National Commercial Bank Jamaica (NCBJ) and its financial subsidiaries began trading on the Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE) yesterday, with the share price rising from $3.70 to $4.00 on the first day due to the sale of 141,380 shares of the new stock.
On Friday, the former parent NCB Group was delisted and has been replaced by the new stock. Investors received one share in the new financial house for every share held in the old group.
In order to trade effectively, shareholders will be required to have a new share certificate or to have had it registered with the Jamaica Central Securities Depository (JSCD) through a stockbroker.
Holders of the old group shares before it was recently reconstituted, who had their shares registered with the JSCD, will now have their new share certificate sent to them and it will be automatically registered.
As of Friday, the Financial Sector Adjustment Company (FINSAC) became a 76 per cent shareholder of NCBJ.
The old group's holdings in the financial services subsidiaries, NCB (Investments), OMNI Insurance Services, Edward Gayle & Company, West Indies Trust Company, Data-Cap Processing, NCB Jamaica (Nominees) have now been effectively transferred to the Bank for nominal consideration. As a result, the new banking group now consists of these subsidiaries, together with NCB Cayman and the Bank.
By virtue of the Scheme of Arrangement, which was approved by shareholders on November 8, 2000, FINSAC's $5.3 billion in par value of preference shares has been converted into ordinary shares and the bank has no preference share obligations.
The restructured new banking group will now focus on its core financial services business as non-core assets and subsidiaries along with related liabilities have been transferred at net book value to FINSAC.
This now means that dividend payments to ordinary shareholders has become more likely and are expected to begin next year.
FINSAC has lent its support to the proposed dividend payment for the year ending 2001, September 30.
