The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has responded to the lawsuit filed by Barbican Capital Limited, an investment firm, regarding the alleged alteration of its shareholding in FBN Holdings.

In its response, the CBN stated that Barbican Capital was only able to provide evidence supporting its ownership of 3,110,400,619 units of shares, representing 8.67% of FBN Holdings’ shares.

The CBN's response was submitted in a 60-paragraph affidavit by Orjiakor Nwabueze, Deputy Director of the Banking Supervision Department.

It revealed that Barbican Capital, through its parent company, had initially submitted a claim of 5,450,999,924 shares of FBN Holdings and sought the CBN’s consent and approval for this shareholding. However, upon verification, the CBN was only able to substantiate a portion of the claimed shares.

“In the course of the verification exercise, plaintiff and its group could only provide evidence for purchase of 3,110,400,619 shares representing 8.67 per cent of the shares of the Defendant and could not provide any evidence of purchase of the remaining 2,340,599,305 shares representing 6.52 per cent of the shares of the defendant being claimed by the Plaintiff and its group.

“Whilst the verification of shares was ongoing, a third party (CBN), having realised that necessary documents were not supplied or provided, wrote the letter of January 5, 2024, to the defendant notifying it of some documents/information not provided to aid the verification exercise. Attached hereto as “Exhibit H” is a copy of the aforesaid letter.

The third party instructed plaintiff and its group to provide material evidence to prove its purchase/ownership of the outstanding 2,340,599,305 shares to verify their authenticity. The 3rd party is still expecting the Plaintiff and its group to come back with relevant materials to enable the 3rd party take a decision to grant consent/approval or not to the outstanding shares,” part of the response read.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has informed FBN Holdings of the results from the verification exercise conducted to date.

It was determined that only 3,110,400,619 shares, which account for 8.67 percent of the Defendant's total shares, could be verified from the total shares claimed by the Plaintiff and its associates. Conversely, 2,340,599,305 shares, representing 6.52 percent of the Defendant's total share capital, could not be verified.

Additionally, FBN Holdings Plc has petitioned a Federal High Court in Lagos to dismiss a lawsuit alleging that Barbican was withholding information regarding an ongoing verification exercise by the CBN concerning its shareholding.

In case number FHC/L/CS/1172/24, Barbican Capital, a subsidiary of Honeywell Group Limited, asserted that it had acquired approximately 5,386,397,202 shares of FBN Holdings, which constitutes 15.1 percent of its shares listed on the Nigerian Exchange.