Ghana-based GCB Bank Ltd. is looking to convert its development finance unit into an investment bank which will be called GCB Securities, Bloomberg News reported May 23, citing Managing Director Anselm Sowah.

The bank has already recruited staff for the investment banking unit, Sowah said.

Sowah told reporters in Accra that the Ghanaian bank is also looking to create a bancassurance business in partnership with a foreign insurer and wants to begin work on establishing new subsidiaries in English-speaking countries in West Africa in 2019, the report said.