Femi Otedola has spent roughly ₦412 billion buying First HoldCo shares in 2026 alone, pushing his stake to 27.49 percent and reviving questions about how far Nigeria's regulatory framework will let him go before his ambition of majority control collides with banking and takeover law.

Few ownership stories on the Nigerian Exchange have moved as fast in 2026 as Femi Otedola's accumulation of First HoldCo shares. What began as a chairman's routine confidence-building purchases has turned into one of the most aggressive single-investor buying campaigns the exchange has seen in years, and it is now forcing a genuine conversation about where shareholder confidence ends and regulatory control questions begin.

What Happened

On August 14, 2026, Otedola added another significant block to his holding. Mr Otedola purchased 147,737,699 additional shares at N140 per share, valued at N20.7 billion, through Calvados Global Services Limited, and following the purchase, he now holds a total of 12.05 billion shares, representing about 27.49 per cent of the company. The transaction was his second stake increase in August alone, and it capped a buying spree that has been building since the start of the Nigerian summer, since his position stood at 9,277,792,037 shares on June 30, 2026 and 10,177,494,288 shares by July 29.

The pace of accumulation since has been striking. He acquired 1,779,094,976 shares on July 30 at between ₦124.90 and ₦125.00, then a further 138,041,465 shares on August 7 at ₦131.20, before this month's ₦140-per-share purchase. Business Day's tally puts his disclosed 2026 spending at roughly ₦412 billion, and Otedola's total shareholding is now valued at about N1.65 trillion, based on the company's share price of N136.90.

That buying has coincided with, and arguably helped fuel, an extraordinary rally in the stock itself. First HoldCo shares gained 131.13 percent during July alone, closing the month at ₦129.55 against ₦56.05 at the end of June, and the company overtook Zenith Bank as the most valuable lender on the Nigerian Exchange. Otedola has been explicit that this is not passive investing. He has indicated a target equity control of over 51 percent, aiming for outright majority ownership of First HoldCo Plc, and has pointed to his history of exactly this playbook at other companies, since at Forte Oil Plc he increased his stake from 28% to 75% before exiting the company in 2019, and at Geregu Power Plc he raised his ownership from 51% to 95% before reducing it to 77% following the company's public listing in 2022.

Why It Matters

Otedola's rising stake is now bumping directly against Nigerian securities law. Under the Investments and Securities Act (ISA) 2025, a person cannot acquire shares, whether through a series of transactions or otherwise, that carry 30 per cent or more of the voting rights of a company without engaging the takeover provisions of the law, subject to applicable exemptions. At 27.49 percent, Otedola is close enough to that line that analysts are already parsing the distinction between accumulation and a formal takeover trigger, since at about 27 per cent, Otedola is already a substantial shareholder under the banking regulatory framework, but he has not yet crossed the 30 per cent takeover threshold. It's also worth noting how much his position has grown structurally: First HoldCo's own 2025 audited accounts showed his direct and indirect interests were just 18.12 per cent as of December 31, 2025, before this year's buying spree began in earnest.

The stake increase also lands squarely inside First HoldCo's own recapitalisation push, adding a strategic rationale beyond simple confidence signaling. Shareholders approved a special resolution authorising the company to raise up to N253.099 billion, clearing the path for chairman Femi Otedola's ambition of pushing Nigeria's oldest bank toward a N1 trillion paid-up capital base, roughly double the CBN's N500 billion minimum for banks with international licences. That ambition is backed by genuinely strong underlying numbers, since First HoldCo's pre-tax profit rose 83 percent to ₦654 billion in H1 2026, with gross earnings reaching ₦1.93 trillion, up about 17 percent from a year earlier, and profit after tax rising 82 percent to ₦526 billion.

Industry Context

Otedola's buying is happening against a backdrop of tightening regulatory scrutiny of bank ownership structures more broadly. The Central Bank has proposed its own overhaul of holding company rules this year, with a draft requiring Financial Holding Companies to maintain a minimum 51 per cent equity stake in each of their subsidiaries and to be registered as persons with significant control, changes designed to improve transparency and beneficial ownership disclosure across the financial sector. That regulatory direction, emphasizing clearer, more accountable ownership structures, arguably makes a chairman consolidating toward majority control a more legible outcome to regulators than a fragmented free float, even as it raises separate questions about concentration of power in a systemically important bank

What Flipbz Thinks

Flipbz sees Otedola's accumulation as one of the more transparent tests yet of how Nigeria's newer securities and banking rules handle a determined, well-capitalized chairman pursuing outright control of a listed financial institution rather than a passive shareholder. His stated intent, more than 51 percent, combined with a share price that has already tripled this year, means every future purchase will draw more scrutiny of the 30 percent ISA threshold, and how regulators and the Exchange manage that line will likely become a reference case for future concentrated-ownership situations in Nigerian banking.

What to Watch

Investors and regulators should watch whether Otedola's next disclosed purchase pushes him past the 30 percent ISA takeover threshold, since that would force clarity on whether formal takeover provisions apply. It's also worth tracking how the CBN's proposed HoldCo ownership reforms interact with his stated 51 percent target once finalized.

The Bottom Line

Otedola's roughly ₦412 billion buying spree has made him First HoldCo's dominant shareholder in substance if not yet in name, and the coming months will show whether Nigeria's regulatory framework treats his march toward majority control as routine confidence-building or something requiring a formal takeover process.