Kenyan banks are looking at entering new markets in Africa while deepening their presence in East Africa as they seek to grow revenues from regional operations.

Equity Group Holdings, KCB Group, NCBA Group and Family Bank have declared intentions to spread their operations in new markets mainly in the Southern region.

Equity Group said it is looking at entering Angola, Mozambique, Zambia, Ethiopia and Libya as it targets to be in 15 countries in the next four years.“The first country of interest is where we have had our representative office for the last seven years -- Ethiopia. It's natural,” said Equity Group Managing Director and CEO James Mwangi.“But also Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been opened through the Lobito Corridor in Angola -- that is where all the minerals going to the US are passing and the ones going to China are going through Mozambique. So those two countries become very attractive; but you can't do Mozambique without Zambia.”

“In Uganda and Tanzania, if we get an opportunity to grow, we will because we want either to be number one or number two in any market we play. Expansion has two aspects to it; deepening and presence,” Mr Mwangi said.

NCBA Group, which is in a transaction to be acquired 66 percent by South African Nedbank, has identified DRC and Ethiopia as its next destinations.“We've talked very strongly of our desire to be in markets such as DRC and Ethiopia when it opens up. We also intend to continue investing in our business in West Africa - all that continues to be part of our strategy and Nedbank is very supportive of that strategy,” said NCBA Group managing director John Gachora.

NCBA Group has physical presence in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda; and a digital business in Ivory Coast and recently Ghana.

KCB Group, Kenya’s largest bank by asset base, is targeting to enter the Ethiopian market before the end of the year indicating it had already identified prospective acquisition targets. KCB will be deploying part of the proceeds from the sale of National Bank of Kenya to Nigeria’s Access Bank to finance the targeted acquisition in Ethiopia

Family Bank, a mid-sized lender, is eyeing regional expansion with Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo on its radar.

The bank which intends to list on the Nairobi Securities Exchange by the end of June this year, raised $62 million (Sh8 billion) last year through private placement, part of which is earmarked for expansion.“We've already done a bit of scouting in a number of countries -- not to be disclosed at this point in time,” said the bank chairman, Lazarus Muema.

Sources within the bank told The Eastafrican that the targeted markets were DRC and Uganda.

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