The first half of the 2023 investor presentation of Bank South Pacific Financial Group Ltd (BSP) was presented today to display the progress and results in the region and the country.
BSP Group CEO Mark Robinson emphasized that BSP, so far the leading South Pacific brand is continuing strong profits and shareholder returns, the company’s capital base remains solid, and attractive economic growth rates and movement to digital channels.
“We are the payments leader in our geography executing over 25 million payments every month. The returns that we deliver continue to be very strong and we continue to share those returns with our shareholders. With 88 percent of our shareholders are Papua New Guinea based, the balance has spread far across the region”, stated Robinson.
The results showed that the Net profit after tax increased by 7.6 percent from the first half of 2022, earnings per share increased by 7.6 percent from the first half of 2022 and the market capitalization increased by 2.3 billion on the ASX.
“Capital base continues to be among the strongest capital base you will see for a bank with a total capital adequacy of 22.5 percent and the economic outlooks in which we operate looks quite strong not just for the banks but forecasts for key markets as well”, he added.
The income trends show that income increased by 4.2 percent to K1.3b in the first half of 2023. Despite loan growth of 8.3 percent, net interest income growth was lower by 1.6 percent due to lower yields from government securities. FX income increased by 14.7 percent, due to higher volumes and fee income by up to 4.4 percent driven by growth transactions via payment channels.
Robinson is confident that BSP is gradually moving to digital channels and is keeping the momentum in terms of strong profits and returns.