Nigerian billionaire Jim Ovia gains $144 million on Zenith Bank shares in third quarter

Nigerian banker Jim Ovia saw the value of his stake in Zenith Bank Plc rise by $143.8 million in the third quarter of 2026, as the lender's shares climbed 27.6% on the Nigerian Exchange.

Ovia founded Zenith Bank in 1990 and remains its largest individual shareholder, with 5,801,238,332 shares, about 14.1% of the company. He stepped down as chairman on May 5. He holds his shares through several companies, including Institutional Investors, Lurot Burca, Jovis Nigeria, Veritas Registrars and Quantum Zenith Securities.

Zenith shares closed at 105.05 naira on July 1 and at 134 naira on Sept. 30. Billionaires.Africa calculations show that the rally lifted the value of Ovia's stake from $441.6 million to $585.4 million over the quarter.

A stronger naira added to the gain. The currency firmed from 1,380.17 naira per dollar on July 1 to 1,328.02 naira on Sept. 30, which added about 4% to the dollar value of the holding.

Zenith is one of Nigeria's biggest banks. It has ranked first among Nigerian lenders by Tier 1 capital, the core measure of a bank's financial strength, for 16 consecutive years, and it reported pre-tax profit of more than 1 trillion naira for 2024.

The bank's shares were also lifted by a change in how global index providers treat Nigeria. On Sept. 21, FTSE Russell moved Nigeria from unclassified to frontier status and added Zenith to its frontier market indexes, along with nine other Nigerian companies. Inclusion in those indexes can bring in buying from funds that track them.

Zenith's board proposed doubling its dividend for 2025 to 10 naira a share, a payout worth about 58 billion naira to Ovia on his current shareholding.

Adaora Umeoji, Zenith's group managing director and chief executive, also gained. Her 285,096,933 shares rose in value by about $7.1 million during the quarter, to $28.8 million.

Zenith ended September with a market value of about 5.5 trillion naira.