NCB Financial reports lower earnings from banking and investments

 

The NCB Financial Group says earnings from banking and investment activities were lower for the period ended October to June.

 

Chief Financial Officer for the group, Malcolm Sadler, says net revenues from banking and investment activities amounted to $57.3 billion, which was four per cent or $2.3 billion lower than the same period in 2023. 

 

"This was primarily due to lower unrealised gains on securities. There were also higher credit impairment losses, mainly in our payment services and corporate and commercial banking segments. The group, however, recorded higher net fees on commission income and net interest income, driven by increased transaction volumes, growth in the loan and investment portfolios, as well as improving yields. Our primary focus will continue to be on growing our core revenue streams," he disclosed. 

 

He said net revenues from the group's insurance segment amounted to $36.9 billion.

 

This reflected an increase of $12.2 billion or 50 per cent over the prior year. 

 

"This was primarily attributed to one, increased fair value gains, two, a non-recurring net gain of $3.3 billion, an adoption of IFRS 17, related to the redesignation of certain financial assets, and three, increased net insurance service results."

 

He aded that operating expenses of $69.1 billion were held within a one per cent or $833 million increase over the previous year. 

 

"Our costs, optimisation efforts, and focus on revenue generation resulted in improvement in our cost income ratio, which reduced to 69.16 per cent from 77.35 per cent in the prior," Mr. Sadler reported. 

 

He was speaking at the company's Investor Briefing on Friday.