Fidelity Bank Plc has posted double digit profits and gross earnings as it released its first quarter result for 2017.
Despite the challenging and fiercely competitive business environment, the financial institution’s unaudited results showed that its gross earnings rose by 18.8 per cent from N34.4 billion in 2016 to N40.8 billion for the corresponding period at March 31, 2017.
The Bank’s profits in the period surged by 20.5 per cent from N4billion in 2016 to N4.8billion in 2017, just as it recorded growth in net interest income, deposits, loans and other performance indices.
Chief Executive Officer, Fidelity Bank, Mr. Nnamdi Okonkwo, explained that the double digits growth in earnings and profits underscored the disciplined execution of its medium-term strategy and a business model that enabled the bank to continue to deliver improved performance in line with its 2017 financial year targets.
“Gross earnings growth was driven by a combination of increased yields on earning assets and an absolute growth in the volume of earning assets, which led to a 24.1 per cent year-on-year growth in interest income,” he said.
The Fidelity Bank boss added that, “Our cost optimization initiatives continued to deliver cost savings as total operating expenses declined y-o-y by 10.4 per cent to N14.4 billion, this was driven by a decline in over 60 per cent of our operating expense lines in Q1 2017. We will continue to optimize our cost profile without impacting service delivery through the disciplined execution of the initiatives from our recently completed business optimization project.”
Deposits, which is a measure of customer confidence, in the period under review, grew quarter on quarter by 0.9 per cent to N800 billion in March 2017 from N793 billion as at December 2016, with low cost deposits accounting for 79.4 per cent of total deposits.
On the whole, the bank’s retail strategy has continued to deliver impressive results with savings increasing by 5.6 per cent to N163.7bn as at March 31, 2017.
