NBP maintains growth, post-tax profit up by 46pc

KARACHI: A meeting of the Board of Directors (BoD) of the National Bank of Pakistan (Bank) was held here on Thursday at the bank’s head office in Karachi, in which the BoD approved the financial statements of the bank for the half year ending on June 30, 2018.

The bank recorded a pre-tax profit of Rs17.16 billion being 26 percent higher than the Rs13.61 billion earned during the corresponding six-month period of 2017. The after-tax profit for the period amounted to Rs12.49 billion i.e. 46 percent higher than the Rs8.55 billion for the corresponding period of 2017. This translates into earnings per share of Rs5.87 as against Rs4.02 for the corresponding period last year. Meanwhile, “the best results” were declared a day after the NBP president was suspended, and the on the day when he challenged his suspension at the Islamabad High Court.

The bank’s net interest, mark-up income increased by 15.7 percent to Rs31.14 billion against Rs26.05 billion for the corresponding period of 2017. This was achieved through maintaining an efficient asset-mix of high-yield loans and investments. The bank has recently introduced changes in its operating structure for better service quality to enhance customer loyalty. Income from dividend and capital gains however recorded a drop due to the lacklustre performance of the stock market. Overall non mark-up, interest income for the period amounted to Rs15.25 billion which is marginally lower by 2.7 percent as compared to Rs15.68 billion for the corresponding period last year.

With a 12.1 percent growth by reference to December 31, 2017, the balance sheet size of the bank has increased to Rs2.66 trillion. As of June 2018, the bank’s deposits amounted to Rs1,910.67 billion being 10.6 percent higher as compared to that of December 31, 2017. The net advances also increased to Rs790.4 billion showing an increase of 6.8 percent as compared to December, 2017.