One of Zimbabwe’s biggest banking groups, CBZ Holdings Limited, said this week it is targeting US$100 million in new credit lines this year, with US$80 million already secured.
The financial services giant is moving to capitalise subsidiaries and fund a regional expansion drive, in a strategy that shows growing confidence in its balance sheet and long-term outlook.
Group chief executive officer Lawrence Nyazema said part of the funding would also be channelled towards productive sectors, including mining, manufacturing and agriculture.
The fresh funding push follows an aggressive capital mobilisation drive last year. In 2025, CBZ sought US$300 million in new credit lines, securing US$200 million by June to support exporters, and the tobacco industry among others.
Of the facilities secured during the period, US$130 million constituted new credit lines.
The funding drive helped strengthen the group’s balance sheet, with total assets rising to US$1,58 billion, up from US$1,33 billion a year earlier.
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Nyazema said the bank had already made significant progress towards its new funding target.
“For 2025, we got new lines of credit of US$130 million. We repaid US$88 million that was due for repayment, which gives you a net of US$42 million. For this year, we are aiming at the bank (CBZ Bank) to get at least US$100 million, and US$80 million of that has already been signed off. We just need to draw it down,” he said.
“Then at CBZ Holdings, which is the group company, we are expecting to bring in US$50 million, and the US$50 million is what we will use to capitalise some of our subsidiaries, as well as in our regional expansion.”
Nyazema said the bank would continue directing funding to key productive sectors while maintaining limited lending to individuals.
“The focus is on the mining industry, the focus is on manufacturing. Agriculture has been a sweet spot for us over the years, and housing is a key area that we want to support,” Nyazema said.
“You start with agriculture, because once you get your agriculture right, it means food security is assured. Mining is a key one for us to take advantage of.”
He added that manufacturing remained critical as it provides value addition to agricultural raw materials.
Nyazema said the bank would also prioritise mobilising deposits to expand its lending capacity.
“We want to continue attracting deposits, and the reason we want to attract deposits, be they current accounts or lines of credit, is it enables us to pass on that funding to the sectors of the economy that are hungry for capital,” he said.
“We have been failing to meet demand for capital.
“I would like us to continue supporting those sectors in a bigger way. My own target is for us to get a loan book of at least US$500 million.”
Last year, loans and advances to customers totalled ZiG10,18 billion, equivalent to US$392,1 million.
The CBZ group chief said credit lines were largely sourced from African development finance institutions (DFIs), including the African Export-Import Bank.
“I am glad to say we are talking to an American institution, and if we get that breakthrough, it will be a significant one in that we will be diversifying our sources of capital from not just African DFIs but also looking much broader,” Nyazema said.
A breakthrough with a US institution would mark a significant shift, after years in which targeted sanctions restricted many Zimbabwean financial institutions’ access to global development finance institutions.
Across the continent, banks are increasingly adopting diversified funding strategies as traditional sources of cheap capital tighten. African lenders, long reliant on multilateral and regional DFIs, are now blending these facilities with commercial lines, diaspora-linked funding, and structured trade finance instruments.
Regional lenders have remained critical anchors, particularly for trade finance and infrastructure-linked lending. However, rising global interest rates and tighter risk pricing have made these lines more expensive and, in some cases, more selective.
In response, banks are increasingly targeting non-traditional partners, including private credit funds, Middle Eastern financiers, and, where possible, US and European institutions. This shift is aimed at broadening currency access, reducing concentration risk, and improving pricing flexibility.
At the same time, deposit mobilisation is re-emerging as a core funding pillar, especially in markets with high liquidity volatility. Banks are also securitising assets, leveraging export receivables, and using guarantees to crowd in external capital.
For frontier markets such as Zimbabwe, the ability to tap into a wider pool of international capital remains constrained by country risk perceptions.