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The FTSE 100 will get a brand new financial institution inventory later this month, becoming a member of HSBC, Lloyds, Barclays, NatWest, and Normal Chartered within the UK’s premier index. That is the lender’s reward for its share value hovering an unbelievable 877% previously 5 years.
Dividends take the entire return effectively north of 1,000% over this era!
Let’s take a better take a look at this Footsie beginner to see whether or not it could be value contemplating shopping for.
A rocket on the London Inventory Alternate
The inventory in query is Lion Finance Group (LSE:BGEO), previously Financial institution of Georgia. It is going to enter the FTSE 100 in two weeks when the most recent modifications happen. Becoming a member of it will likely be on-line buying and selling platform IG Group, whereas airline easyJet and Hikma Prescribed drugs will drop out.
What has induced this unbelievable efficiency? Put merely, Lion Finance has benefitted from an extremely sturdy Georgian economic system.
Between 2021 and 2024, GDP progress averaged over 9% yearly, pushed by monetary inflows, low inflation, greater consumption, an inflow of expert migrants fleeing the warfare in Ukraine, rising tourism, and the nation’s location as a buying and selling/logistics hub between East and West.
The financial institution has taken full benefit of those fertile situations, with earnings rising at a five-year compound annual fee of about 50%. Dividends and share buybacks have been plentiful, attracting extra traders to the inventory.
The acquisition of Ameriabank (the main financial institution in neighbouring Armenia) in 2024 offered a second high-growth engine.
I offered too quickly
Alas, I beforehand owned this inventory however offered it in late 2024 when issues kicked off in Georgia after the contested election consequence there. This noticed mass public protests collect throughout the nation amid accusations of vote-rigging. Issues seemed very dicey on the time.
With the nation’s ascension to the European Union on maintain, and the federal government going through worldwide scrutiny, I feared political unrest may result in decrease overseas direct funding and tourism. I personally delay visiting Tbilisi on the time.
Nevertheless, whereas logical, my fears have been in the end misplaced. Final yr, Georgia’s economic system grew by 7.5%. And whereas that did mark a slowdown from earlier years, Georgia stays one of many fastest-growing economies in Europe and the Caucasus, as does Armenia.
Lion Finance’s web revenue in 2025 jumped 21% to GEL 2.2bn (roughly £600m), with an distinctive return on common fairness of 28.4%. Retail digital month-to-month energetic customers grew 15% in Georgia, reaching over 1.8m, up from simply 355,000 in 2019.
In the meantime, Ameriabank’s digital month-to-month energetic customers surged by 45.3% to 336,000, with standalone revenue rising 23.6%.
Worth on provide
Clearly, the financial institution has been firing on all cylinders lately. However is the inventory value contemplating because it enters the FTSE 100? I feel it’s, regardless of the aforementioned political dangers, which may flare up at any level between the pro-Russia and EU-aligned political factions.
The ahead price-to-earnings ratio is simply six, which is effectively beneath the FTSE 100 common and different financial institution shares. Pair this with a really well-covered 3.5% dividend yield, and I see plenty of worth on provide right here.
Be aware, the Worldwide Financial Fund initiatives Georgian GDP progress of 5% over the medium time period. Plus, Armenia presents plenty of long-term progress in digital banking. Immediately Ameriabank’s digital penetration is simply round 11% of the general inhabitants.
