Sterling Bank posts ₦8.2 billion profit in nine months

Sterling Bank Plc’s unaudited result for the nine-month period ended September 30, 2018 showed a Profit After Taxes (PAT) of ₦8.2 billion higher than the ₦5.9 billion posted in the corresponding period of 2017.
   
Specifically, the bank’s net profit for the period rose by 39 per cent from ₦5.9 billion to ₦8.2 billion, while earnings per share improved from 21 kobo to 28 kobo.
 
Sterling Bank in a statement said its Profit before tax grew by ₦8.5 billion or 29.5 per cent against ₦6.5 billion a year ago. Gross earnings rose by 21.1 per cent to ₦114.6 billion during the period compared with ₦94.6 billion last year. 

Total assets improved to N1.08 trillion as against ₦1.07 trillion recorded at the beginning of the year while shareholders’ funds increased from ₦102.9 billion in December 2017 to ₦106.2 billion in September 2018.
   
The bank’s Liquidity Ratio (LR) improved from 30.5 per cent in December 2017 to 34.4 percent in September, while Capital Adequacy Ratio (CAR) stood at 11.4 per cent. Non-Performing Loan Ratio (NPLR) improved considerably from 6.2 per cent to 5.4 per cent.

The Chief Executive Officer of the bank, Abubakar Suleiman, said:  “Our strategic intent to be more customer-focused has continued to yield results. One of such recorded in the last quarter is the increase in the volume of transactions processed through our various electronic platforms since the start of the year.

We achieved over one million monthly NIBBS Instant Payment transactions as at July 2018, a 73 percent increase from the start of the year and expect to see continuing traction in this regard,” Suleiman said.