By Dipo Olowookere
The board of United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc has given shareholders of the company a reason to smile and possibly prepare for a feast as it has increased the interim dividend payout for 2021 by 17.7 per cent.
On Thursday, the financial institution released its financial statements for the period ended June 30, 2021, to the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited and it was stated that shareholders will get 20 kobo as cash reward compared with 17 kobo they received in the same time of last year.
Business Post reports that UBA has fixed Thursday, September 30 for the payment of the half-year dividend but it would only be given to shareholders whose names appear on the register of members as at the close of business on Thursday, September 23.
A look at the results showed that the gross earnings increased by 5.0 per cent to N315.3 billion from N300.3 billion in H1 2020, driven by an increase in the contributions of the Rest of Africa and the Rest of the World operations.
The revenue from the Rest of Africa grew to N141.9 billion from N107.2 billion last year, the earnings from the Rest of the World also rose to N9.6 billion from N9.2 billion, while the total revenue from its Nigeria operations depreciated to N171.2 billion from N189.6 billion.
In terms of the earnings from its operating segments, the corporate arm of the business generated N88.3 billion in the first six months of this year, higher than the N55.3 billion in HY 2020; the retail and commercial arm raked N156.9 billion, lower than the N184.8 billion in the same period of last year, while the treasury and financial markets segment generated N70.1 billion, higher than the N60.2 billion a year ago.
In the accounting period, UBA recorded a net interest income of N148.1 billion compared with N119.3 billion in the same time of 2020, driven by higher interest income and lower interest expense of N74.6 billion compared with the N86.3 billion posted in the first half of 2020.
In addition, the net fees and commission income closed higher at N45.8 billion versus N38.6 billion in H1 2020 due to the fees and commission income of N74.1 billion in the period under review compared with N55.9 billion in the same period of last year and fees and commission expense of N28.3 billion in contrast to N17.3 billion it printed 12 months earlier.
However, the net trading and foreign exchange income significantly went down to N9.1 billion from N35.2 billion, while other operating income rose to N9.5 billion from N3.6 billion.
In HY 2021, the lender pruned its employee benefit expenses to N42.6 billion from N44.6 billion but could not tame its other operating expenses, which jumped to N78.8 billion from N78.0 billion due to higher fuel, repairs and maintenance costs; bank charges; deposit insurance premium; and banking sector resolution costs.
The financial statements showed that the pre-tax profit of UBA increased by 33.5 per cent to N76.2 billion from N57.1 billion, while the net profit improved by 36.5 per cent to N60.6 billion from N44.4 billion, with the earnings per share (EPS) at N1.69 in contrast to N1.24 in the first six months of last year.
The total assets of the bank moved to N8.3 trillion in H1 2021 from N7.7 trillion in FY 2020, while the total liabilities rose to N7.6 trillion from N7.0 trillion, with deposits from customers accounting for N6.1 trillion of the total liabilities compared with N5.7 trillion as at December 31, 2020.
