Barclays Profits Up 4%
Pauline Dikuelo | Monday September 10, 2018 13:31
The bank attributed the growth to net interest income, contained costs and expected credit losses.
Speaking during the financial results presentation recently, the Barclays managing director (MD) Reinette van der Merwe said the bank’s performance has been resilient as they sustained a positive direction.
“These positive results reflected our ambition to be a leading financial services provider in the market,” she said.
The MD said despite the more stringent accounting for credit losses, the bank’s expected credit losses impairments decreased by 12.3% in comparison to the prior period.
“The bank delivered results that underscored our resilience as a business. The results were realised in the midst of various external challenges such as the declining credit growth across the sector, low interest rates and a general recovery of commodity prices,” she added.
She said the bank continues to review its retail model to reposition and realign branch networks to provide optimal service. In the first half, the MD said they launched three initiatives all of which fall under the education and skills development pillar of their growth strategy.
On his part, Barclays finance director Mumba Kalifungwa mentioned that the local banking environment continues to be competitive adding that growth in the sector has generally been modest.
“However, we continue to explore opportunities for growth whilst driving balance sheet efficiency and sweating our electronics channels,” he said.
According to Kalifungwa, key components of the bank’s balance sheet continue to be driven by loans and advances as well as customer liabilities, which speak to the primary drivers of the total revenue.
During the reporting period, he said loans and advances to customers increased by 14% year-on-year to P11.4 billion.
“The growth was fairly distributed across the segments in line with our strategy and continues to be focussed on prudent lending in our chosen business segments,” he said. He further said customer liabilities increased six percent year-on-year driven by continued customer focus and penetration across all the segments noting that the growth compares favourably against the banking industry growth of four percent year-on-year.
“Driving growth and creating possibilities for our customers will continue to be our driving force in stimulating our goal in pursuing revenue growth,” he said.