The Bank of Maldives – national bank of the island nation – released their annual report for 2018 on Thursday, 11 April stating strong business performance and increased profit for the entire run of last year.
According to the bank, the profit before tax was at MVR1.6 billion which is a 13% increase on the figures of 2017. The press release from the bank read the significant positive result was “achieved notwithstanding the higher funding costs and unlike the previous year, performance did not benefit from any one-off gains.”
Furthermore, the bank notes that the profit after tax had surpassed the MVR1 billion threshold for the past three consecutive years.
In addition to this the bank’s ratio of non-performing to total loans had reduced to 3.5% from 4.1% with a provision cover of 100 percent.
Due to the bank’s “robust financial position” its board has proposed a record dividend for 2018 at MVR129 million, MVR24 per ordinary share.
Bank of Maldives had continued its investment program during the previous year as well in order to support local individuals, businesses and communities. It was reported that the bank had spent MVR300 million under their ‘Aharenge Bank’ initiative.
Moreover, the bank adds to its portfolio of community service by supporting more than 110 projects which supported charitable, educational, sports and environmental causes across the country.
The bank’s deputy CEO and In-Charge Aishath Noordeen said “the increasingly robust financial strength provided a positive platform for significant community investment and positions the bank to continue the investment moving forward.”
“The bank has reached a standard of performance that we are determined to sustain and build upon. I would like to thank our extremely dedicated staff for their hard work during the year. I would like to extend my thanks and appreciation to all our customers for your ongoing confidence in the bank. We will continue to work tirelessly to meet your expectations in terms of service standards, product offerings and indeed everything we do.”
The deputy CEO had further highlighted on the bank’s positive and strong performance of last year stating “performance benefit from solid growth across most core business sectors and income sources. Further improvements in loan book quality significantly strengthened the bottom line with our ratio of non-performing to total loans falling to 3.5%. The bank also adopted the new Accounting Standard IFRS 9 Financial Instruments during the year.”