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Idrissa Nassa, the Burkinabe businessman who controls Coris Holding, secured a significant liquidity boost this week after the West African Development Bank approved two refinancing lines totaling CFA30 billion, about $52.5 million, for subsidiaries of Coris Bank International in Burkina Faso and Senegal.
The decision came at BOAD's 150th board meeting, chaired by Serge Ekué, the bank's president. Both lines are designed to shore up liquidity at the two subsidiaries and expand their capacity to lend in markets where access to credit remains limited. The board's approval reflects BOAD's growing role as a regional backstop for banks with strong growth trajectories.
Coris Bank International Burkina Faso will receive the larger allocation: CFA20 billion. BOAD said the funds are tied to two specific priorities. The first is broadening access to renewable energy across the country. The second is supporting SONAGESS, the National Food Security Stock Management Company, in financing food stockpiles for the 2025-2026 agricultural season. Together, the investments are intended to strengthen both energy and food security while widening access to clean energy solutions for households and businesses in Burkina Faso.
Coris Bank Senegal receives the remaining CFA10 billion. That facility targets medium-term financing for productive investment, with small and medium-sized enterprises and industries as primary beneficiaries. BOAD framed the support as a tool for accelerating the subsidiary's commercial growth in an increasingly competitive West African banking market.
The refinancing fits into Nassa's wider continental push. Coris is exploring entry into Cameroon and Gabon as part of a strategy that blends debt financing with capital consolidation to deepen the group's presence in new markets across the region.
BOAD is moving in the same direction. Under its "Djoliba... The Next Phase" strategic plan, endorsed by the WAEMU Council of Ministers, the bank has set a target of CFA6,500 billion in financing between 2026 and 2030, a figure that would nearly double its pace of intervention over the prior period.
The numbers support that ambition. At year-end 2025, BOAD's total assets reached CFA5,363 billion, up 38 percent from the prior year, while equity came in at CFA1,780.5 billion, equal to 33.2 percent of the balance sheet. That capital base gives the bank real weight as a development partner and positions it to keep backing institutions like Coris as they scale across the continent.
