GT Bank Group half year profit dips
Guaranty Trust Bank plc, the parent company of Guaranty Trust Bank (Ghana) Limited, has recorded a profit before tax of N53.40 billion (about USD324 million) for the first half of the year.
The amount represents a seven per cent dip from the N57.4 billion (USD348 million) it recorded in 2013.
According to the bank, the phenomenon was “due to loan impairment charged to the Profit and Loss account during the period”.
“This impairment charge was as a result of a significant loan that the bank decided to provide, following the demise of the obligor; in line with GTBank’s laid down corporate governance practices”, the bank added in a statement released to the Daily Graphic in Accra.
Meanwhile, the bank said “A review of the audited financial results for the half year ended June 30, 2014 released to the Nigerian and London Stock Exchanges show positive performance across key financial indices, despite extremely challenging business environment and increasing regulatory headwinds”.
For instance, the bank’s gross earnings for the period grew by seven per cent to N132billion (about USD801 million) from the N124billion (USD753 million) reported for the same period last year.
The bank’s loan book also grew by 16 per cent from N899 billion (about USD5.5 billion) recorded in June 2013 to N1.04trillion (about USD6.3 billion) in June 2014 while total customer deposits increased by eight per cent to N1.54trillion (about USD9.4 billion) during the same period.
The Managing Director/CEO of the Group, Mr Segun Agbaje, paid glowing tribute to management and staff of the bank as he attributed the bank’s performance for the 2014 half year period to the hard work across all subsidiaries of the bank as well as what he described as the “continued support from its customers”.
He was optimistic that the second half of the 2014 financial year “will be a stronger period during which the bank will make positive improvements in its market positions across its key products and business segments”.
“We have, to date achieved over a million downloads of our mobile banking applications and experienced a 25 per cent increase in active internet banking users in Nigeria alone”, he stated, pledging the bank’s commitment to offer continuous quality service to its customers.
The Managing Director of Guaranty Trust Bank (Ghana) Limited, Mr Lekan Sanusi, for his part said “It is always a delight to see that our bank is doing well, despite challenging business operating environments. This performance goes to once again assure customers and other stakeholders that they are doing business with a strong brand”.
The GT Bank group has always been at the forefront of industry service innovations within markets where it operates, having successfully replicated its culture of excellence in banking subsidiaries in Cote D’ Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Uganda and the United Kingdom.