Bright Simons, IMANI Africa’s Honorary Vice President, has revealed that a Big Chief has a bid to take over the Bank of Ghana (BoG) GoldBod financing.
According to Bright Simons, the Big Chief from the North, and also a former multinational bank CEO, just put a gold deal on Ghana’s table.
In a post shared on X, Bright Simons further detailed, “1. A Big Chief from the North, who is also a former multinational bank CEO, just put a gold deal on Ghana’s table.
2. He says he has the country’s banks in his corner. It’s clever. It’s well-timed. And it has some serious gaps, each of which deserves its own thesis.
3. Ghana’s GoldBod burned through GH¢88.52 billion (~$7.2bn) in just nine months of 2025, buying gold from small-scale miners. It sold back GH¢86.51 billion worth.
4. The Bank of Ghana was left holding $214 million in losses. The IMF stared disapprovingly. Something had to give.
5. Enter LVSafrica. Whilst some of us were shouting ourselves hoarse in TV studios, their analysts were crunching numbers to sniff out a deal. The firm’s chairman – a mighty traditional chief, chair of state enterprises, and decades-long CEO of a major multinational bank – has now made his calls and regally put down his cards.
6. In his model, private banks would fund the gold purchases. The central bank steps back. Problem solved, right?
7. Not quite. Read the fine print. First, private banks already get some of the gold dealing gigs from the BoG already, just not a lot. So, any model would have to do more than just get private banks into the room.
8. Second, and more critically, the BoG is still written into the deal structure as transaction obligor, escrow bank, and foreign-exchange allocator. The proposal doesn’t move it out of the firing line. It just rearranges the targeting rules.
9. The headline return (“profit margin”) is 17.87% annualised. That number is doing a lot of persuasive work.
10. But it rests on a 25-pesewa FX spread that banks would pocket on every dollar cycled. Tighten that spread to 15 pesewas, and the return collapses to 2.3%. At 10 pesewas, it turns negative.
11. Strangely, the promoters’ analysts left out the sensitivity analysis in the prospectus.
12. Then there is the concentration problem the prospectus doesn’t mention at all. Between July and October 2025, 98.2% of GoldBod’s export value flowed to India and the UAE. The top four buyers took 78.4% of total value. One sanctions event, one payment dispute, one Gulf corridor disruption, and this elegant short-tenor revolving structure seizes up bigly.
13. The collateral story is also thin. No SPV, no bankruptcy remoteness, & no perfected security over receivables.
14. The guarantees too feel contradictory. As structured, most serious credit committees would wring it through many cycles.
15. None of this means the idea is weak. A commercial, revolving, self-liquidating commodity trade-finance structure is definitely going to play a role in GoldBod’s cedi-timing problem. Rumours are that GoldBod itself is pitching its own version.
16. The LVSafrica promoters have superb instincts and impeccable timing.
17. But there is a wide gap between a smart concept and a bankable deal. Especially in this kind of fraught political economy context.
18. The sophisticated banks will stretch this hard before they sign anything.
19. But still, watch that space.
20. Big cash is in the air.
Full analysis in subsequent comment”.
In related news, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has insisted that the Gold Board (GoldBod) made US$214 million losses in its operations.
According to the IMF Director of Communications, Julie Kozack, the GoldBod’s $214 million loss stemmed from trading activities, fees, and exchange rate movements.
Speaking at a press briefing on Thursday, 15th January 2026, IMF Director of Communications Julie Kozack stated, “The loss stemmed from trading activities, fees, and exchange rate movements. While it is not formally recorded on the government’s fiscal balance sheet, it ultimately represents a cost to the state”.
“These steps are critical to ensure the Bank of Ghana remains financially sound,” she concluded,
Julie Kozack stressed the need for clearer reporting and enhanced oversight of the gold purchase programme.
However, Sammy Gyamfi, the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Gold Board (GoldBod), has said any loss under the Gold-for-Reserves (G4R) is not attributable to an eight-month-old GoldBod.
Speaking on JoyNews’ Newsfile on Saturday, January 3, Mr Gyamfi explained, “That program, any loss under it is not attributable to an eight-month-old GoldBod, neither is it attributable to mismanagement or incompetence by the BoG. Dr Asiamah [BoG boss] is a hero; he and that wonderful team at BoG have not, through mismanagement or incompetence cause any loss”.
“So we are not saying we have not made a loss, but somebody has made a loss through mismanagement. No, that is the policy design, and it is so sad that those under whom the policy was introduced are now feeling ignorant about the policy objects and the policy design,” he added.
Sammy Gyamfi further clarified that the Gold-for-Reserves (G4R) is being run by the Bank of Ghana (BoG).
See the people below:
1. A Big Chief from the North, who is also a former multinational bank CEO, just put a gold deal on Ghana's table.
— Bright Simons (@BBSimons) March 22, 2026
2. He says he has the country's banks in his corner. It's clever. It's well-timed. And it has some serious gaps each of which deserves its own thesis.
3. Ghana's…