Senior Transaction Officer at African Development Bank - AfDB

Position Number: 50097569
Location: Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire
Position Grade: PL5

The Complex

• The President plans, supervises and manages the business of the Bank Group. Under the direction of the Boards of Directors, the President conducts the business of the Bank and the African Development Fund and manages operations and activities in accordance with the Agreements establishing the African Development Bank and the African Development Fund.
• The President supervises several Departments and Units including Office of the President; Independent Development Evaluation Department; Integrity and Anti-Corruption Department; Compliance Review and Mediation Unit; Secretariat to the Sanctions Appeals Board; Administrative Tribunal; Office of the Auditor General; Group Risk Management Directorate; General Counsel and Legal Services Department; Communication and External Relations Department; Staff Integrity and Ethics Office and Office of the Secretary General & General Secretariat.

The Hiring Department / Division

• The Africa Investment Forum in The Office of the President assists the President in planning, supervising and managing all activities related to the efficient and timely delivery of the mandate of the Africa Investment Forum.
• Africa Investment Forum (AIF) is a multi-stakeholder, multi-disciplinary platform dedicated to advancing private and public-private-partnership projects to bankable stages, raising capital, and accelerating the financial closure of deals. The AIF is Africa’s investment market place, through which the African Development Bank, along with its partners, is structuring transformational deals, screening and enhancing projects, attracting co-investors, and facilitating transactions to close Africa’s investment gaps.
• The AIF objectives are to reduce intermediation costs, improve the quality of project information and documentation, and increase active and productive engagements between African governments and the private sector as well as increase regional integration for developmental impact. The AIF offers investors access to a structured platform offering bankable projects within an enabling environment.
• The Africa Investment Forum facilitates awareness raising about the investment opportunities in Africa for international investors, social impact investors, institutional investors (pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, and others) both local and global. It provides an opportunity for the Africa Investment Forum partners to determine the investment needs of these various categories of investors, facilitate tailored structures and showcase Africa’s investment successes and enabling policies that would be attractive to these various classes of investors who are looking to deploy funds in Africa.

The Africa Investment Forum seeks to deliver on the proposed strategic approach via its pillars as defined below:

• The Platform - selects, supports, and facilitates the origination, structuring and closure of high-impact deals in Africa’s critical sectors through facilitating financing for project preparation & advisory services directly or through its network of advisors. It includes a digital platform for investors and project sponsors to profile their investment interests and deals respectively.
• The Market Place - leads productive engagements and roundtables with both existing and new stakeholders’ thereby deepening relations and diversifying the sponsor, investor and partner base.  
• The Market Days - physically convenes investors, project sponsors and key decision makers at a bespoke platform for investment conversations and closing deals.
• The Deal Tracker - a pioneering structured mechanism designed to facilitate the progress of Boardroom deals, accelerate investor’s commitments, and advance projects further towards and until deal closure.
• Knowledge/Policy Environment - seeks to foster investment friendly regulation, a pro-investment climate to remove bottlenecks to deal closure, as well as disseminate knowledge products.  

The Africa Investment Forum tracks the implementation of commitments made at the actual event to ensure transactions reach financial close and policies and bottlenecks to facilitate Africa Investment Forum projects are implemented.

The Position

• The Senior Transaction Officer is responsible for providing support to the transaction workstream team in originating, Structuring, tracking, and advancing the AIF portfolio deals by ensuring good Quality at Entry (QuE) Sheet, and also support and advise on the technical, legal, financial onboarding documentation for efficient investment facilitation.
• The Senior Transaction Officer is also responsible for advising on non-Sovereign operations towards credit enhancement, transaction bankability, and financial sustainability. Developing structured approaches in the design, preparation and implementation of innovative transactions, projects and initiatives to strengthen the quality of portfolios.

Key Functions
Under the direct supervision of the Manager, Transaction Work stream, the Senior Transaction Officer will perform the following:

• Participate in financial due diligence on new products/programmes, conducted by the AIF;
• Provide advisory, restructuring and operational transaction services;
• Structure opinion drafts, present proposed solutions for investments under consideration, clarify the pros and cons of diverse structuring options;
• Coordinate, through written opinions, the drafting and review of finance and project documentation;
• Lead origination support on equity and debt investment operations of private sector and public-private projects, primarily at origination level but also throughout the project cycle;
• Coordinate activities related to the selectivity and arbitration of equity pipeline;
• Supervise asset class business intelligence gathering (market trends, benchmarking, etc.);
• Review the process and procedures related to the AIF’s equity operations;
• Drive identified work streams around pipeline development, project preparation, policy and regulations, and credit enhancements in collaboration with sector and regional colleagues to advance the Africa Investment Forum.
• Work with legal department to ensure that all deals have appropriate legal documentation and that financial close is achieved in a timely fashion.
• Assist in analysing, understanding and acquainting with financial and economic models prepared by other Stakeholders, including project sponsors/owners;
• Determine the appropriate conversion factors for linking the socio-economic constraints and financial cash flows in the models;
• Provide structuring guidance to investment officers through active engagement in the presentation to clients/sponsors of financing proposals, negotiation of financing mandates, emphasizing the benefits of loan syndication and co-financing services;

Competencies (Skills, Experience and Knowledge)

• Hold at least a Master's Degree in Business Administration, Finance, Banking or related areas;
• Have a minimum of five (5) years of relevant working experience, in the field of development financing, financial services, resource mobilization, project finance. Experience working in developing/emerging market economies;
• Experience working in the Financial sector in Africa and/or specialized experience in similar organization/s would be considered an advantage;
• Professional qualifications such as CFA, FRM, CPA, CA and CMA would be highly regarded
• Prior experience in appraising recourse and non-recourse project finance and corporate loan in the infrastructure, industrial, manufacturing, agribusiness and services sector is necessary;
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills in English and/or French, and preferably with a working knowledge of the other language, fluency in Portuguese is an added advantage.

Behavioral Competencies:

• High Integrity in decision making
• Must be a team player with the ability to engage in the effectively with all stakeholders
• Excellent organizational, administrative, and time management skills including an ability to deal with conflicting priorities and deliver high quality work on schedule;
• Proven ability to work independently and efficiently to deliver under pressure and meet tight deadlines;
• Excellent presentation skills.

Technical Competencies:

• Relevant experience in deal origination, advisory, structuring and project management;
• Demonstrable knowledge of international development financing and the global funding architecture particularly as related to Africa;
• Experience in investment appraisal of multi-sector projects;
• Experience in client and relationship management;
• Results-focused and effective, ability to work under time pressure with high degree of accuracy and with a strong capacity to produce high-quality work;
• Demonstrate initiative, monitor issues and tasks, to meet deadlines and priorities;
• Strong analytical, coordination and organizational skills with capacity to work as part of a team in a multicultural environment;
• Communicate effectively, written and oral fluency in English and/or French with a working knowledge of the other.
• Competence with standard MS Office software, preferable experience of SAP;
• First-hand knowledge and ability to structure a variety of complex of financial instruments (debt, equity and guarantee);
• Experience in direct equity investment and private equity funds appraisal will be an asset;
• Strong experience with Credit enhancement and risk mitigation instruments is preferred;     
• Knowledge of tailored products (such as guarantees) for sector-based investments is desirable;
• Ability to respond swiftly to new situations and to anticipate new issues;
• Proven ability to acquire new skills (particularly in investment, risk capital, technology and innovative sectors);
• Capacity to adapt to the rapidly evolving needs of the AIF's ecosystem.