FBN Holdings hit a N3.3 trillion revenue milestone last year, up from N1.6 trillion in 2023, propelled by a surge in the interest income it earned from granting loans to customers and from investment securities.
That helped drive net profit to N738.9 billion from N310.4 billion.
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The unaudited financials of Nigeria’s oldest lender released on Thursday saw net interest income, which accounts for the difference between interest income and what banks pay to borrowers as well as what it pays for keeping depositors’ money, accelerate to N1.4 trillion from N546.3 billion a year ago.
Over two years of uninterrupted interest rate hiking by the Central Bank of Nigeria has created a honey pot for lenders to feast on as it allows them to continuously increase the rate at which they lend to borrowers.
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The regulator’s expectation that scaling up interest rates will help decelerate inflationary pressures in the economy hasn’t yielded the expected result.
Instead, it has fuelled Nigeria’s worst cost-of-living crisis in recent times.
Impairment charge, the cash the bank put aside to cover loans whose quality has been worsened by repeated payment defaults, rose 82.6 per cent to N410.8 billion.
Fees and other commissions climbed to N302.9 billion from N220.3 billion one year prior.
READ ALSO: FBN Holdings Plc rights issue: The takeaways
First Bank, FBN Holdings’ commercial banking division, is searching for fresh capital to buck up its capital base to at least half a trillion naira ahead of a March 2026 deadline set by the central bank.
It launched a rights issue last year, seeking to raise N150 billion from shareholders.
Profit before tax for the period under review was up by 142.1 per cent at N862.4 billion.
Total assets grew to N26.5 trillion from N16.9 trillion.
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