Guaranty Trust Bank Plc has proposed an interim dividend of 25kobo in its audited half year result for the period ended June 30, 2014.
A review of the result shows positive performance across some key financial indices in spite of an extremely challenging business environment and increasing regulatory headwinds.
Gross earnings for the period grew by 7per cent to N132billion from N124billion reported for the corresponding year period 2013.
A statement by the bank said that Profit Before Tax (PBT), at N53.40 billion, was a 7 per cent dip from N57.4 billion recorded in the corresponding year 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 we decided to provide for following the demise of the obligor, in line with our laid down corporate governance practices,” it stated.
The bank’s loan book grew by 16 per cent from N899 billion recorded in June 2013 to N1.04 trillion in June 2014 and total customer deposits increased by 8 per cent to N1.54 trillion as at June 2014.
Commenting on the results, Mr Segun Agbaje, the Managing Director/CEO of Guaranty Trust Bank Plc, attributed the bank’s performance for the 2014 half year period to the hard work of its staff, commitment of its management team and more importantly, continued support from its customers.
He further stated that the second half of the 2014 financial year would be a stronger period during which the bank would make positive improvement in its market positions across its key products and business segments.
A major objective for the bank this year, as mentioned by Mr Segun Agbaje, is to offer “our customers greater convenience and accessibility to our services using internet and mobile solutions and we have, to date, achieved over a million downloads of our mobile banking app and experienced a 25 per cent increase in active internet banking users.”
