Zimre Holdings eyes expansion in 2025

ZIMRE Holdings, a diversified financial services group, has outlined its key focus areas for 2025, emphasising expansion into North Africa, top-line growth, consolidation and strategic acquisitions.

The group announced that in the second quarter of 2025, it will embark on a capital raise programme to solidify Emeritus Re, which will anchor the group’s expansion plans.

ZHL recently merged its two Botswana reinsurance entities and also recapitalised its Mozambique subsidiary to the tune of US$2 million as part of its strategy to grow regional business.

Group chief executive Mr Stanley Kudenga, during a presentation of the group’s financials for the year ended December 31, 2024, said the company’s growth strategy is anchored on expanding its presence in Africa, leveraging data-driven decision-making, and investing in IT and data management.

“We are aiming for momentum in terms of our plans for top-line growth and consolidation, and we have a strong appetite for acquisitions. You will see us looking around for new acquisitions that will drive our growth.

“But the big one is the Africa trek, and we have dealt with the housekeeping issues in terms of amalgamating and setting the trajectory for our regional operations,” he said.

He noted that the group will start to engage investors to finance the expansion project, and during the second quarter, will embark on a capital raise initiative to support the Africa trek out of Botswana and the Victoria Falls Stock Exchange (VFEX).

“We are already active in Ivory Coast, and we are looking to expand our services in Mozambique in terms of insurance broking and microfinance.

“Apart from reinsurance, we also have other ancillary services that we provide within the group, such as asset management, and we have already established a presence in Malawi,” said Mr Kudenga.

He highlighted that the group has already received board approvals, and what remain are some regulatory approvals.

Mr Kudenga said the group is going to grow its cash-generating capacity and “make Zimbabwe great again”.

During the period under review, the group’s insurance revenue amounted to US$61.86 million compared to US$50 million in the previous year, with the bulk of it coming from reinsurance business, which accounted for 78 percent, followed by life and pensions business at 18 per cent and short-term insurance at 4 percent.

Net investment income was US$12.62 million, while non-insurance income amounted to US$13.54 million. The group’s profit after tax for the year grew by 471 per cent to US$10.33 million.

ZHL chief finance officer (CFO) Mr Zvenyika Zvenyika said the group’s businesses are categorised into clusters: the reinsurance cluster, which is the Emeritus family; the life and pensions cluster, which is Fidelity; the property cluster, which is Zimre Property Investments (ZPI); the wealth management cluster, which includes financial services and Fidelity Asset Management; and the short-term cluster, which is Credsure.

He said Mozambique RE grew by 54 per cent following the recapitalisation of the business to the tune of US$2 million.

The Botswana business achieved a double-digit jump in premium income of 38 per cent after the conclusion of the amalgamation of the two entities.

“We used to have two entities operating in Botswana, so we amalgamated those into one operating unit.

“Zambia has a growth of 30 per cent, and it’s really driven by external business and increased shares, and also the new business line that they have introduced there,” he said.

Mr Zvenyika said Malawi’s situation followed in the footsteps of Zimbabwe in terms of what is happening in the economy, and there was no growth because of currency issues.

“However, we are really excited about that business in terms of its contribution to the group revenue,” he said.

Mr Zvenyika said the reinsurance segment is now making strides into North and Central Africa, and this will solidify its contribution to the group’s revenue.

He said the life and pension business segment also recorded strong insurance growth of 45 pe cent, and this was really underpinned by the innovative product development that the business has been implementing.

“We have seen a strong uptake of their product, and it demonstrates the acceptance of the product in the market.

“Whereas the insurance contribution by the short-term unit, which is Credsure, is 4 percent, the unit recorded strong growth, and the drivers were to do with the increase in market share that they achieved,” said Mr Zvenyika.

Meanwhile, Mr Kudenga said the group will leverage the Eagle Reit as a key vehicle for raising capital to support the expansion of group business and the capitalisation of the infrastructure development drive.

He said phase 1 of the Mazowe Walk project is ready for tenant fit-out, whilst phase 2 completion is slated for the end of 2025.-herald