Directors of the United Bank for Africa Plc, on Wednesday, informed investors through the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) that the 17 kobo interim dividend (down from 20 kobo in prior years) will be credited to the bank accounts of shareholders whose names appear on its register on September 23, 2020.

Qualification date for the dividend, subject to withholding tax, it noted in a filing on the NSE by Bili Odum, its group company secretary, is September 15, following which register of members will be closed on September 16 to enable the registrars prepare for the payment.

Only shareholders “who have completed the e-dividend registration and mandated the Registrar to pay their dividends directly into their bank accounts,” the bank added.

According to the audited financials for the half-year ended June 30, 2020, the group delivered gross earnings of N300.6bn, up from N294bn recorded in the same period of 2019, notwithstanding what it said was “the challenging business and economic environment occasioned by the Covid-19 pandemic,” within the period under review.

Profit before tax stood at N57.1bn from N70.3bn in 2019, while net profit slipped to N44.431bn from N56.739bn.

Commenting on the results, UBA’s Group Managing Director/Chief Executive, Kennedy Uzoka said the result “is yet another demonstration of the resilience of our business model in an extremely uncertain and tough operating environment. We recorded commendable growth in our underlying business in terms of customer acquisition, transaction volumes and balance sheet whilst inflation, depressed yield environment and exchange rate volatilities impacted our net earnings as anticipated.

“Despite the short-term challenges to various economic sectors occasioned by the Covid-19 pandemic, we focused on the fundamentals of businesses in growth-driving sectors of various economies in which we operate and achieved 6.4% growth in gross loan to customers, reaching the N2.3tr mark. The Group achieved N114.3bn (a 10% YoY growth) in interest income from loans and advances to customers, as well as credit related fees and commissions.”

Uzoka added that notwithstanding the lock-down in a number of countries and the general lull in several economic sectors, UBA’s banking channels remained open to customers ‘24/7’, adding that “Fortunately, we had proactively built robust electronic channel platforms to enable us serve customers efficiently, and deliver services to them in the comfort of their homes. Notably, we are adjusting our operating model in response to the ‘new normal’ and will continue to optimise the way we work and serve customers in the days ahead.”

He expressed confidence in the bank’s capacity to deliver good returns to shareholders: “we remain committed to our drive as ‘Africa’s Global Bank’ and confident of claiming and sustaining industry leadership on key metrics across geographies where we operate. We will strive to deliver our services in a sustainable way, ultimately leveraging our best-in-class digital capabilities to delight our 21 million (and growing) customers across 23 countries.”

Also speaking on the results, UBA’s Group CFO, Ugo Nwaghodoh said it “reflects the inherent benefits of diversification as we have seen marked growth in contribution from the subsidiaries across Africa. Our Rest-of-Africa operations have continued to break new grounds in market share gains, providing a buffer for Group earnings.

“As the global and local economies begin to improve, we remain optimistic of a better performance in the second half of the year, with expected improvement in the Group’s NIM and ROAE which stood at 5.4% and 14.4% respectively as at end of H12020.

“We defensively positioned our loan portfolio whilst we grew gross loans by 6.4%, maintaining our prudent risk appetite, even as NPL ratio for the Group moderated to 4.1% (from 5.3% in 2019FY).

“We have prudently set-up reserves for loan impairments in recognition of potential losses on the portfolio, resulting in 150% growth in our provisioning. Albeit, the cost of risk moderated to 0.7% from 0.9% in 2019FY. The Group’s capital adequacy ratio increased to 24.9% providing a very strong buffer for asset growth. We remain committed to maintaining our robust risk management practices, as profitable growth and good asset quality remain our priority in 2020,” he noted.