Harare – Recently rebranded Nedbank Zimbabwe said it achieved a profit after tax of $4.37 million over the 6 months period to June 30, 2018, which is a 61 percent increase over $2.71 million achieved during the same period in the prior year.
The improved performance, according to the Bank, was mainly attributable to growth in total non-interest interest from $8.65 million to $11.48 million on a year on year basis. Non-interest income is income arising from non lending activities such transactional, fees and commission income.
In a statement accompanying Bank’s financial results, Managing Director, Dr Charity Jinya said the bank reported strong performance in the first six months of the year despite the prevailing foreign currency and cash shortages.
“Performance during the first half of the year was achieved while two major projects – the rebranding from MBCA to Nedbank and a rollout of new core banking system were under implementation and launched.
“Strategic initiatives resulted in growth of 26 percent of the Bank’s account base and increase of 271 percent in point of sale machines. These initiatives led to a rise in electronic banking platform transactions which contributed to this strong performance,” she said.
Dr Jinya said the performance of net interest income also contributed to the growth in PAT which increased by 21.9 percent from prior year.
She said total expenses excluding impairment charges at $14.59 million to the six months period to June 30 2018 were 16 percent up on $12.60 million achieved in the first half of 2017.
“The major lines that contributed to this increase were employee costs and administrative expenses which went up by 14 percent and 16 percent respectively.
“The growth in these expenses was mainly from projects related costs (implementation of the core banking system and the rebranding exercise), employee empowerment and an increase in the Bank’s distribution channels.”
Total assets increased by 6.1 percent to $391.51 million from $369.07 million at December 31, 2017 mainly due to an increase in net loans and advances to customers which grew by 14.6 percent and investment in RBZ savings bonds of $70 million.
The increase in the loan book is mainly attributed to increased utilisation of existing facilities.
The Bank said its non-performing loans ratio for the period under review was 6.51 percent down from 7.6 percent reported in December 2017 and this demonstrates Nedbank’s continued focus on improving the credit quality of its lending book.
Total deposits from customers increased by 3.27 percent to $307.16 million as at June 30, 2018, up from $297.44 million as at December 31, 2017 and this is in line with the Bank’s strategic deposit mobilisation initiatives and account growth.
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