GAZETTE REPORTER
Retail and Business Banking segment at premier banking outfit, Barclays Bank Botswana contributed significantly higher percentages to the bank’s profitability for the year ending 31 December 2018, latest company financials reveal.
For the period under review, Barclays made P999.2 million in net interest income. The Retail and Business Banking segment accounted for the bulk of that money at P734.9 million while Corporate and Investment Banking accounted for P264.3 million. The Retail and Business Banking segment made P459.2 million as gross profit while the Corporate and Investment Banking made P179 million. In total the bank made P587.9 in total gross profit. Profit for the year was P454.5 of which the bulk of it, P358.7 was attributable to Retail and Business Banking. Corporate and Investment Banking made P135 million.
Outgoing Managing Director (MD) Reinette Van Der Merwe has asserted that RBB business demonstrated its robustness and resilience by registering a noteworthy performance despite challenging operating conditions.
“RBB Profit before tax increased by 65 percent year on year driven by both revenue growth and favourable impairment performance. Retail banking made significant progress in delivering on our key strategic priorities of growing our customer base, increasing the contribution of fee income to total income and increasing usage of our digital channels,” she said.
“In order to bring around the clock convenience to group savers, internet banking services were extended to Motshelo groups. The mobile App was revamped to give it a fresh look and feel with better user experience. User security on the App was enhanced with the addition of Fingerprint identification on both Android and iOS devices. The bank acknowledges the importance of the physical branch network as part of our delivery strategy. To that end, we relocated Kanye branch to a new and more spacious premises in order to provide better service to our clients in the area. Business Banking has again delivered solid growth on both Balance Sheet and Income statement. The business continues to drive its Relationship Banking model and remains focused on enhanced product development and improving client service. In the past year, the business launched Purchase Order finance solution, Internet Banking for SME’s and kick-started the Enterprise Supply Chain Development (ESD) value proposition for start-up and small businesses where capacity building is important.” Revealed the outgoing MD.
“Barclays has achieved a Profit before Tax (PBT) of P638 million for year under review, underpinned on a normalized basis, representing a growth of 14 percent, year on year,” said Van Der Merwe. She said the bank’s positive growth momentum was a result of its resilience.
The MD also indicated that most of the growth came as a result of their strong product development capabilities which enhanced a swift upgrade to the investment environment.
Finance Director, Mumba Kalifungwa noted that “overall the financial services sector has seen credit growth as compared to the previous year. As a bank we remain focused on driving growth through provision of various products and continuing to stretch our various channels in the quest to give our customers a memorable service experience,’’ added Kalifungwa.
In 2018 Barclays introduced normalized reporting so as to cater for the inclusion of separation costs. According to the Finance Director the essence of the approach is to remove the effect of separation costs from the underlying performance.