Unity Bank Plc, in its Half-Year unaudited financial statement, made a marginal increase of two per cent in it’s its deposits to N333.38 billion, compared to N327.42 billion recorded in H1:2022.
The growth in deposits demonstrates incremental gains by the lender from its commitment to deepening its retail footprint through a well-diversified banking product suites that caters to different segments of the retail market.
According to the result submitted to the Nigeria Exchange Group Limited (NGX), the company recorded gross income and total assets within tha period at N27.5 billion as against N27.4 billion and N512.1 billion from N510.1 billion respectively.
The net loans portfolio reduced significantly by 31 epr cent to N198.6 billion as at 30 June 2023 from N289.4 billion as at 31st December 2022. The Bank’s NPL Ratio remained moderate at below three per cent while liquidity ratio stood strong at over 45 per cent.
However, the Bank’s profit for the period was impacted by foreign exchange revaluation on the back of Nigeria’s recent FX liberalization policy, resulting in the lender suffering a revaluation loss of N35 billion within the period.
Notwithstanding, the retail lender grew its FX trading income significantly by 17 per cent to N239.8 million from N204.4 million in the corresponding period of 2022, underscoring the Bank’s strategic focus on diversifying and growing its earnings portfolio.
Similarly, fees and income commission also witnessed a 10 per cent growth to N3.5 billion from N3.2 billion compared to the corresponding period of 2022, on the strength of the growing popularity of its digital banking platforms and customers’ acquisition in the retail space.
Commenting on the financial statements, the Managing Director/CEO of Unity Bank Plc, Mrs Tomi Somefun noted that the significant disruptions which characterized the operating environment has impacted the positions of the Bank to the extent that we have constraints in income generation on the back of revaluation of the bank’s net foreign liabilities occasioned by the Naira devaluation during the period.
Mrs Tomi stated: “In the light of the prevailing FX revaluation in the financial system, what we have is a market-driven impact which is adjustable envisaged from the positive economic outcomes of the government policies in the near term.
“Be that as it may, the negative shareholders’ fund has improved considerably through the injection of N135billion which moderated the negative shareholders’ fund from N275 billion in December 2022 financial year-end to N178 billion as at the end of June 2023, after absorbing the FX revaluation loss suffered in Q2/2023.
“We are however, focused with clear-cut plans to close out on our recapitalization programme very soon to enable us do business as expected in the fast-growing markets in Nigeria,” she said.
She further stated that while the board remained optimistic that the government’s policy initiatives would lead to cause correction in the market, the Bank had accelerated measures to ramp up asset creation and liability generation in the short and medium term.
“The Bank is aggressively driving its retail growth in every segment of the market, expanding strategic partnerships; and growing commercial banking business to develop new and sustainable income lines for the Bank as well as pay sufficient attention to fast-paced process automation, cost and resource efficiency, targeted value chain relationships, and product marketing to enhance value creation in the market,” she said.
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