GTB declares N53.4bn half-year pretax profit

Guaranty Trust Bank plc has declared a profit afore tax of N53.4bn for the first a moiety of 2014.

The bank’s audited financial results for the moiety year ended June 30, 2014, which it file with the Nigerian and London Stock Exchanges on Thursday, showed that it recorded magnification across major indices.

In the review period, GTB grew its gross earnings by seven per cent to N132bn from the N124bn it osted for the corresponding period of 2013.

It profit afore tax, however, dipped by seven per cent to N53.4bn from N57.4bn in the same period of the antecedent year.

The bank, which had explicated in a verbalization on Wednesday that it faced prodigiously challenging business environment and incrementing regulatory headwinds in the period, explicated that the drop in PBT was due to loan impairment charged to the profit and loss account during the period.

“This impairment charge was as a result of a paramount loan that we decided to provide for following the demise of the obligor; in line with our laid down corporate governance practices,” the verbal expression read in part.

The moiety-year results showed that GTB grew its loan book by 16 per cent from the N899bn recorded in the six-month period ended June 30, 2013 to N1.04tn in June 2014, while total customer deposits incremented by eight per cent to N1.54tn in the review period.

The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, GTB, Mr. Segun Agbaje, attributed the bank’s performance for the period to the strenuous exertion of its staff, commitment of its management team and more importantly, perpetuated support from its customers.

Agbaje, however, expressed optimism that the second a moiety of the 2014 financial year would be more positive.

This, he expounded, was because the bank was expected to make positive amendments in its market positions across its key products and business segments.

According to him, a major objective of the bank in the 2014 financial year is to offer its customers more preponderant accomodation and accessibility to its accommodations utilizing internet and mobile solutions.

“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,”Agbaje disclosed.

The verbal expression expounded that the bank had always been at the forefront of industry accommodation innovations within markets wherein it operates, having prosperously replicated its culture for excellence in banking subsidiaries in Cote D’ Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Uganda and the United Kingdom.

According to it, recent accommodations introduced include; the GTBank SME MarketHub, an online e-commerce platform.