UNITY Bank Plc has released its audited financial results for the year ended December 31, 2016, to the Nigerian Stock Exchange posting of gross earnings of N84bn and profit after tax of N2.1 billion.
A review of the Bank’s performance shows positive growth across key financial metrics, an attestation of the progress of its repositioning efforts. Despite the economic headwinds, the Gross earnings for the year grew by 7% to N84billion from N78billion reported in December 2015; driven largely by growth in transaction-based income.
Operating expenses was down by about three to N26 billion in 2016 from N29 billion in December 2015. This represents a significant step by the Bank in maximizing derived benefits through the efficient allocation of resources and cost containment initiatives embarked upon by the new management.
Profit before tax however stood at N1.82 billion, representing a decline of 22 per cent from N2.34billion recorded in the December 2015. This is attributed to higher impairment charge of N35billion in 2016; up by eight per cent from N27 billion charged in December 2015 arising from impairment charges on loans.
The bank also grew its deposit liabilities by 14 per cent from N231 billion recorded in December 2015 to N264 billion in December 2016. This is indicative of increased customer confidence in the Bank, renewed customer care and the emerging innovative products rolled out during the year to delight its teeming and growing customers throughout Nigeria and beyond.
Commenting on the result, the Managing Director/CEO, Tomi Somefun said: “the key performance indicators point to increasing resilience in the face of challenging economic headwinds that characterized the operating environment in 2016.
“Despite the harsh operating environment, the Bank remains stable having driven strategic choices to inspire greater market confidence and leveraging cost optimization strategies, presence in the Northern markets which served as a bulwark, just as the deepening of our presence in Lagos /Southwest also balanced its outlook in the Southern markets. The proactive steps and efficiency gains arising from major business decisions produced encouraging results that elicited double digit growth in deposit portfolio of the Bank during the year.
“The direction for the Bank in the coming years is to diversify the earnings base and target growth in double digit territory by aggressive pursuit of new business opportunities in the Retail & SME businesses, Agribusiness, financial inclusion, digital banking, increase portfolio mix and drive more traffic to our channels with strong collaboration from our institutional and financial investors that are poised to add a new phase of business revolution to our growth model.”
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