NEW YORK. — Bob Diamond’s Atlas Mara Ltd. on Tuesday said it could combine with Barclays Africa if a consortium considering buying the African arm of Barclays succeeds. The potential purchase would turn Africa banking group Atlas Mara into a major brand in South Africa and more than a dozen other countries, and revive its prospects after a rocky two years that saw its share price halve.“Our ambition when we started (Atlas Mara)was to build the leading, premier financial institution in sub-Saharan Africa,” Mr Diamond said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal Tuesday.

“If a transaction like this (the acquisition of Barclays Africa) was to happen, it would just accelerate our strategy in one swoop, giving us more countries and a larger platform,” he added.

Atlas Mara said the combination of Atlas Mara with the much larger Barclays Africa would be backed by investors including investment companies of its co-founders, Mr Diamond’s Atlas Merchant Capital and Ashish Thakkar’s Mara Group.

The Wall Street Journal and other media reported Sunday that Atlas Merchant Capital had teamed up with U.S. buyout firm to put together a bid for Barclays Africa, which has a market cap of $8,3 billion.

Mr Diamond and Mr Thakkar co-founded Atlas Mara in 2013 to raise shares on the London Stock Exchange and build a sub-Saharan Africa bank. Backed by US shareholders, Atlas Mara bought assets in countries including Nigeria, Zambia Zimbabwe and Rwanda, but struggled to gain traction as investors soured on emerging markets and its shares sank. Atlas Mara’s assets are around $2,4 billion, compared with Barclays Africa’s $75 billion in assets.

Meanwhile, Mr Diamond’s other main vehicle, Atlas Merchant Capital, has been looking for purchases after raising around $260 million, but its focus has been on developed markets.

Mr Diamond is a former chief executive of Barclays and helped lead the British bank’s push into Africa in the 2000s. He left Barclays in 2012 after the bank entered a settlement over alleged interest rate rigging.

Barclays last month announced it would sell its 62.3 percent stake in Barclays Africa, after deciding it didn’t fit its strategy and burned up too much capital.

Barclays Africa owns 12 banks across Africa, the biggest of which by far is South Africa-based Absa, one of the country’s largest lenders.

Atlas Mara appeared to be a natural purchaser, but it was hard to see how it could raise billions of dollars when its market cap is less than $300 million.

Analysts believed that Barclays PLC would retain a roughly 20 percent non-controlling stake in Barclays Africa, but Mr Diamond said the bid he was putting together with Carlyle would be for the whole chunk held by his London-based former bank.

He didn’t want to divulge any further details about who was in the consortium, but said that it has amassed “committed long-term strategic investor, this is not private equity this is permanent capital.”

Mr Diamond and Atlas Mara chief executive, John Vittalo, who previously served as CEO of Barclays Africa, said in the interview that Atlas Mara’s investment thesis remains attractive despite the fact that several African economies are losing steam, because of lower oil and mineral prices and the Chinese industrial slowdown.

“Now is the time to press ahead even more aggressively for acquisitions,” Mr Vitalo said.

“These economies are seeing headwinds; but there are headwinds today and the long-term thesis is absolutely intact,” he added.

Zambia, where Atlas Mara agreed to purchase Finance Bank of Zambia late last year, has seen its economy collapse over the past year because of diminished Chinese demand in its key export, copper. In the course of 2015 the local currency, the kwacha, lost half its value against the dollar.

Mr. Thakkar, a 34-year-old England-born Ugandan who sometimes advises African heads of state, and Mr Diamond, the 64-year-old American who became the face of Britain’s post-financial-crisis banking scandals, set up Atlas Mara shortly after meeting at a dinner party in 2013.

Mr Diamond and Mr Thakkar, both Atlas Mara directors, won’t be part of any potential talks with the consortium about a merger, Atlas Mara said.

Atlas Mara shares rose more than 4 percent in London and Barclays Africa shares closed 0,7 percent higher in Johannesburg. — WSJ.

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