DEAP Capital transforms to Africa’s minerals, metals finance powerhouse

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DEAP Capital is expected to unlock not less than $2 billion in critical minerals and metals within two years, with strong backing of global private funds to meet high-end projects as new partnerships emerge.

The emergent company will provide bespoke financing, advisory, and capital structuring solutions to operators across the critical minerals’ ecosystem in Nigeria and other African countries with a view to enhancing the continent’s role in global supply chains linked  to digitisation, energy transition, industrial manufacturing, and advanced technologies.

The transformation of DEAP Capital comes at a time Nigeria keenly seeks to diversify its economy and lead Africa’s minerals renaissance through increased domestic exploration and processing of critical minerals and metals.

Nigeria is leading the call for private-sector led structured capital to develop sustainable domestic and regional mining infrastructure as part of private public partnership to extract greater value addition and move Nigeria and Africa’s mining operations beyond raw mineral exports.

The emergent company from the Thursday’s meeting is expected to open vast new opportunities for African businesses in the metals and minerals space to access global capital effortlessly.

The emergent company will develop an integrated financing model combining mineral-focused private equity, project finance and structured credit, commodity offtake financing, beneficiation and processing investments, downstream commercialisation, capital markets issuances such as notes, bonds and convertibles as well as global trading linkages across the London, Hong Kong and Africa corridors.

The transformation will birth a new company capable of structuring African mining potentials into investible and globally bankable value, providing critical intermediation across mining, processing, beneficiation, logistics and storage, commodity trading, structured finance and private equity.

The emergent company will help to enhance the position of Africa as a fully integrated critical minerals powerbase with capability to avert global supply chain vulnerabilities in the critical mineral space.

Africa boasts of nearly one-third of global mineral reserves, several of which are abundantly domiciled in Nigeria.  Critical minerals are crucial to modern-day technologies and have been scientifically-proven to power the economies of today and tomorrow.

Critical minerals and rare earth are required to meet the manufacturing needs of green technologies or renewable energy, high-tech manufacturing, aviation, aerospace and national defense. They are used to make mobile phones, computers, batteries, electric vehicles, solar panels and wind turbines among several advanced technologies.

Ahead of the meeting, and following the MoU and the capital injection, the board of DEAP Capital had been reconstituted to enhance requisite domestic and global expertise necessary for the achievement of the strategic objectives of the emergent group.

The new board composition, which had been approved by Nigerian regulatory authorities and will be presented for shareholders’ ratification on Thursday in line with extant capital market rules, included Founding Chief Executive Officer of Saudi Mining Exchange and Mumbai Commodity Exchange (MCX), Lamon Rutten; a leading Nigerian specialized finance expert, Dr. Israel Ovirih; a top banker, Mr. Tope Oduseso and technology entrepreneur and businessman, Francis Ekeng.

Rutten, an internationally respected commodities and capital markets executive with over three decades of experience in commodities exchange development, structured commodity finance, and market infrastructure, was Chief of Energy at United Nation’s UNCTAD, wherefrom he was seconded to pioneer the setting up as Joint Managing Director of the Multi Commodity Exchange of India (MCX).

Under his leadership, MCX grew to becoming the second largest commodity exchange globally in 2011 with a turnover of $2.9 trillion.  He also successfully concluded MCX’s initial public offering (IPO) of $1.5 billion and played a pivotal role in the establishment of India’s largest collateral management firm, NBHC.

He was also the founding Chief Executive Officer of Indonesia Commodity & Derivative Exchange (ICDX) between January 2017 and July 2022.

Rutten also served as the Chief Executive Officer of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Mining Exchange as well as member of the Advisory Board of Ajlan & Bros Metal Corporation, a diversified Saudi group with investments and assets under management in excess of $50 billion.

Ovirih sits on the board of various minerals and natural resource-based businesses including Jos, Plateau State-based Continental Lithium Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Continental Critical Minerals Inc, of Cayman Islands. 

He also chairs the board of Banklink Africa Group, reputed for having raised, with its global partners, over $1 billion for Nigerian banks and companies. 

Oduseso is the Group Chief Executive Officer of RichGreen Masters Group and has over three decades experience in the Nigerian financial sector. He has extensive expertise in financial management, internal control and regulatory compliance.  

Ekeng pioneered telecom cell-site expansion across Africa in the early 2000s and most recently launched Numoni, a regulated reward-technology platform within the financial ecosystem.  He is a seasoned business executive and serial entrepreneur with experience in real estate development, financial technology, telecommunications and commercial asset management across Eastern and Western Africa.