BLANTYRE (MaraPost)–One of the commercial banks in the counntry, National Bank of Malawi (NBM) has announced a group post-tax profit off K12.7 billion, representing an increase of 68 percent from the previous year.
NBM says despite the operating environment of the banking sector was characterised by liquidity challenges especially in the first half of the year, it registered satisfactory growth in almost all of its business lines following the increased capacity utilisation of its clientele.
The bank has since declared a dividend of K6.20 per share.
The financial statement further says this was also due to improved availability of fuel, foreign currency and raw materials compared to 2012.
“Year on year deposits grew up by 36 percent which were mostly channelled to money markets investment,” says the statement.
It has also attributed the profit growth to the Reserve Bank of Malawi’s continued tight monetary policy stance exercised through mopping-up operations and the maintenance of a high interest rate regime.
However, the Malawi Stock Exchange listed bank says it expects the growth estimates to be revised downwards on account of the recently announced suspension of production of uranium cake at Kayerekera mine, as a result of the fall in world uranium prices.