Zemen Bank has announced a partnership with Mastercard that will see the introduction of the first-ever Mastercard branded prepaid contactless travel card in Ethiopia. Zemen Mastercard prepaid travel cards will enable cardholders to use cards with either of the two major currencies, U.S. Dollars and Euros, based on their travel destination.
Ethiopia's Zemen Bank announced it has sold close to 200 million birr in shared in the past two month, achieving its target of capital increase for the fiscal year. The sale of shares has been limited to existing share holders in the bank. The total capital of the bank now stands at 400 million birr, a two fold increase from the previous year.
The Bank noted that its deposit base in the first nine months of the current fiscal year has increased 42 percent and had passed 2.5 billion birr, all mobilized from a single main branch.
Zemen Bank, Ethiopia is acquiring land in the Sengatera area to build its head quarters. The Bank has completed 99% of the process associated with acquiring the land according to Ermias Eshetu, Deputy Marketing President. 
The bank’s headquarter building is expected to be the tallest in an important part of the financial district in Addis Ababa. The Zemen Bank headquarters will be erected in front of Addis Ababa University School of Commerce according to the announcement made by the bank at the official launch of the construction design last Thursday.
Anteneh Assefa, Vice President of Operations at the Bank of Abyssinia has been nominated as the president of Zemen Bank, Ethiopia. The Board of Directors of Zemen Bank has submitted its nomination to the National Bank of Ethiopia.
The last president of Zemen Bank Brutawit Dawit resigned earlier this year for personal reasons. Helawi Tadesse, Senior Vice President has been acting president ever since. The board of Zemen decided upon a nominee after serious deliberation assessing professionals in the banking sector according to sources.
Zemen Bank sold 35 million birr worth of shares in six hours last week. The shares were offered to existing shareholders as per a decision reached at the annual meeting of the bank.
The annual meeting held this past September agreed to increase the capital of the bank by 100 million birr with remaining shares, after shareholders were offered shares in proportion to their existing holdings, to be sold in the month of December.
The bank management had expected to complete the sale of the shares in 30 days according to sources at the bank.
