Shareholders of Access Bank Plc will get a 30 kobo final dividend after the bank announced today March 17th, 2016 that it has made a profit after paying tax of N65 billion. The bank had initially paid an interim dividend of 25 kobo per share when it announced its half year results in 2015. This means that the bank paid a total dividend of 55 kobo for its 2015 financial year.
The good news for shareholders is that the bank’s profit after tax of N65 billion in 2015 is more than twice the profit after tax of N31 billion made in 2014. This shows that the bank is getting more profitable despite the increasingly difficult operating environment in Nigeria.
The result also shows that the bank is growing its earnings at a significantly impressive rate. Gross earnings in 2015 shot up 37.5 percent to N337.4 billion in 2015 from N245.4 billion in 2014. The bank’s income from loans also shot up a significant 17.5 percent to N208 billion in 2015 compared to N177 billion in 2014. But the expense on deposits also rose a significant 33.2 percent to N102.4 billion in 2015 compared to N76.9 billion paid out to depositors in 2014.
This could indicate that Access Bank is offering higher interest rates in a bid to attract deposits. The bank’s deposit base grew by 11.6 percent to N1.77 trillion in 2015 lower than the growth in interest expense.
Access Bank could have made a higher profit but for a 38.9 percent growth in operating expenses in 2015 to N145.3 billion when compared to 101.8 billion incurred expenses in 2014.
Access Bank has fixed its annual general meeting (AGM) May 27, 2016 and will pay dividend the same day if approved by shareholders. The bank’s share price closed at N4.14 kobo n March 17, 2016 and is down by about 14.8% since the beginning of the year.
