Aliko Dangote, president of the Dangote Group, says the planned initial public offering (IPO) of Dangote refinery might be conducted in September amid investor demand running into “billions of dollars”.
Dangote spoke on Wednesday when Femi Otedola, chairman of First HoldCo, visited the refinery.
Otedola led top executives of First HoldCo on a tour of the refinery and the fertiliser plants in the Lekki free trade zone area.
“There is quite a lot of demand in terms of people pushing us, saying we want to buy, we want to buy,” the group president said.
“That is the reason why we are trying to make sure that by September, we will be out there in the market to sell the IPO. But we have a lot of demand in billions of dollars.”
Asked about the target listing price, he said advisers are still working on the valuation.
“I actually don’t know. The advisers are still doing that. They are still evaluating to see how much we are going to go into the market with,” Dangote said.
Speaking on an earlier proposed $2 billion private placement, the businessman said requests from prospective investors have already exceeded that figure.
“We are not selling up to that, but we’ll see what we can allocate to them. We can see what we can allocate to an IPO,” he added.
The group president said the company intends to broaden ownership through the public offer and allow more Nigerians participate in the refinery project.
He also highlighted the scale of the refinery, describing it as one of the most ambitious industrial projects globally.
“Our target really is to get the larger part of the society to buy. Because it is a very good… I think it’s better you buy… you are looking at this now, people don’t know we are going to have 10 percent of the entire America’s production in terms of refining,” the billionaire said.
“It’s going to be the largest refinery ever on the earth of this world.”
He added that based on current projections, the refinery business alone could generate more revenue than any other company on the continent.
‘DANGOTE REFINERY HAS SAVED AFRICA FROM ECONOMIC SLAVERY’
Advertisement
Speaking during the visit, Otedola said the management and board of First HoldCo have set an ambitious target of transforming the institution into one of the biggest banks in sub-Saharan Africa and West Africa within the next five years.
Otedola said the visit was part of efforts to draw lessons from Dangote’s business vision.
“I spoke to Aliko that please can we visit, come for a retreat and tap into your vision, and it’s been very insightful, very thought-provoking,” he said.
Otedola wished Dangote, whom he described as “a colossus” and “a genius,” and “probably one of the greatest men that has come out of Africa,” continued success “for delivering us out of economic slavery in Nigeria and by extension Africa”.
