Pan Asia Bank, has closed its financial year ended December 31, 2016 recording a profit before tax of Rs 1.8 billion, an increase of 17% over the previous year.
Meanwhile the Bank increased its profit after tax by 20% for the same period to Rs.1.25 billion or Rs.4.24 a share, surpassing its previous earnings record. The Bank is also in the process of raising equity over Rs. 2 billion via a rights issue which will issue one new ordinary share for every two existing ordinary shares held.
The Bank’s acting Chief Executive Officer, Lalith Jayakody attributed the performance to the proactive measures taken to successfully acclimatize the Bank to the rising interest rate scenario from the beginning of 2016.
“Our performance is a clear testament to Pan Asia Bank’s ability to deliver excellent performance despite the challenges thrown at us by the economic headwinds”
Although the economic conditions were less supportive towards the banking and the financial services sector due to rising interest rates and the tightened credit conditions, we could still achieve these record numbers because we remained nimble to adjust ourselves fast to the new economic order,” he said.
Meanwhile for the quarter ended December 31, 2016 (4Q’16), the Bank reported an earnings of Rs.4.65 a share or Rs.346 million which translated in to an increase of 19%. The Return on Equity (RoE) which measures the return generated towards the shareholders, a widely used performance matrix in the banking industry stood at 19.97%, above the industry average of 17.30%. Pan Asia Bank remains among the few banks which have a RoE with a 20% level.The Bank’s principal source of income, the Net Interest Income rose by a modest 16.93% to Rs.4.63 billion.
This was a significant achievement at a time when the banking sector margins were coming under pressure due to low interest rates prevailed during most part of the year.
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