Republic Financial Holdings Ltd is making an offer to buy out Republic Bank (Grenada) Ltd. In a notice posted on the T&T Stock Exchange yesterday the banking group, which already has 51 per cent shareholding in that financial institution, announced that the offer document will be mailed out to shareholders on May 9 ahead of the offer period which opens on May 11. Republic Bank Ltd, as it was then known, bought its majority stake in the former National Commercial Bank of Grenada Ltd (NCB) from the Government of Grenada in July 1992. In April 2006, it was renamed Republic Bank (Grenada) Ltd, in a move designed to unite the two banks and greater capitalise on competitive advantages from systems and processes alignment. The T&T-based banking group, which was originally called Colonial Bank when it was formed in 1837, is one of the largest and most profitable banks in the English speaking Caribbean with 15 subsidiaries and more than 4000 employees in T&T, Grenada, Barbados and Guyana. In 2013, it became a major stakeholder on the African continent through the acquisition of a 40 per cent stake in HFC Bank (Ghana). In 2015 this stake was increased to 57 per cent. For the financial year ending September 30, 2015, the group’s total assets stood at $66 billion and profit was $1.22 billion—a 2.5 per cent increase over 2014. Source: trinidadguardian