First Citizens Group Financial Holdings CEO Karen Darbasie says the bank has a solid and growing client base of about 35,000 in Tobago.
“We continue to be a lender to all aspects of Tobago customers,” she told Business Day on Monday during an interview at the bank’s Canaan office.
Darbasie added the bank’s commercial clientele is also growing.
[caption id="attachment_963767" align="alignnone" width="1024"] First Citizens CEO Karen Darbasie said the group plans to work with Tobago to promote investment and the development of the island. - FILE PHOTO[/caption]
First Citizens has three branches on the island – Canaan, Scarborough and Roxborough. It has a staff of about 75 employees.
Another branch is currently under construction along the Claude Noel Highway, Lowlands, obliquely opposite to the main entrance to Canoe Bay. That outlet, she said, is expected to replace the Canaan branch because it has outgrown its space.
Darbasie said the Lowlands branch should be open to customers by October.
“When you start a branch, there is a phasing in kind of period where we start to put the staff in and allow customers to come in but not a full launch yet – kind of a trial period to iron out logistics and so on. We are hoping to do that in September and hoping to have the grand opening in October.”
Darbasie, who met with Chief Secretary Farley Augustine on Monday, described her relationship with the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) as “very, very strong."
“I have met with the chief secretary on three or four occasions (since the Progressive Democratic Patriots assumed office in December 2021). We are working on many fronts with them.”
In fact, she said, “The ‘chief’ would often say we are his banker. First Citizens is the banker of the Tobago House of Assembly.”
Asked her impressions of the PDP’s $3.97 billion budget presentation on June 23, Darbasie said, “Ambitious. But I think he (Augustine) has a lot of plans for development and plans require funding. So you have to be ambitious and you have to be optimistic and you have to drive the development that he clearly is envisioning.”
Darbasie was in Tobago to promote the bank’s latest additional public offering (APO) –10,869,565 in shares at $50 a share, which Finance Minister Colm Imbert had mentioned during the 2021-2022 budget presentation last October. The APO could raise about $550 million.
The bank said the shares will only be available up until July 22, at 4 pm. Investors must have a brokerage account and submit an application form.
[caption id="attachment_963769" align="alignnone" width="1024"] First Citizens branch in Canaan, Tobago. - PHOTO BY DAVID REID[/caption]
Darbasie, who officially began her duties as First Citizens CEO on April 7, 2015, urged customers to embrace the opportunity.
She said staff from First Citizens Brokerage Advisory Services would be in Tobago next week to open accounts for people interested in purchasing shares in the APO. The team will also be in Tobago the following week.
“It is an opportunity to invest in some
