Access Bank Makes History as First Financial Company to Surpass N1 Trillion Gross Earnings in a Year
- Access Bank has achieved record-breaking gross earnings of over N1 trillion for the year 2022
- This is the first time a financial institution in Nigeria crossed the N1 trillion mark in one year
- Despite impressive earnings, the bank's profit for the year dropped due to challenges in Ghana's market, among others
PAY ATTENTION: Сheck out news that is picked exactly for YOU ➡️ click on “Recommended for you” and enjoy!
Access Holdings Plc, the parent company of Access Bank has set a new achievement in the banking industry.
According to its financial statement released on Wednesday, April 19, 2023, the financial company gross earnings increased to N1.38 trillion in 2022 from N971.8 billion recorded the previous year.
This is the first time a financial institution in Nigeria will cross the N1 trillion earnings in a single year.
Source: Depositphotos
How Access Bank performed
Despite impressive gross earnings, Access bank after-tax profit for 2022 dropped to N152.20 billion from N160.215 billion reported in 2021.
PAY ATTENTION: Join Legit.ng Telegram channel! Never miss important updates!
The decline in profit was primarily attributed to the bank's operations in Ghana.
Access Bank invests heavily in government debt offerings, including Treasury bills and bonds, like other financial institutions, because of its relative safety.
However, Ghana's economic challenges led to debt restructuring, costing Access Bank a whopping N103.10 billion.
Part of the bank's statement reads:
"The Group took an impairment of N103.10Bn in recognition of the economic loss impact of Ghana's sovereign debt crisis (Domestic debt and Eurobonds).
Also, Access Bank reports that it recorded impaired loans and advances of N176.94 billion.
What that means is that the bank was unable that its customers' given loans and advances failed to pay.
Breakdown of Access Bank's financial result
- Income tax- N14.77 billion
- Deposits from customers- N9.25 trillion
- Loans and Advances to customers- N5.10trn
- Fee and commission income- N197.58bn
- Final dividend of N1.30 kobo per share for its shareholders worth N46.20 billion
Expert views
Speaking about the company's results, Muyiwa Oni, Regional Head of Equity Research for West Africa at Standard Bank Group, said that the result was impressive and surprising as he expected Ghana bond default to have a bigger effect on Access earnings.
His words:
"I was expecting the worst in terms of earnings, because of the bank's exposure to Ghana market currently going through challenging time.
"Many Nigerian banks are invested heavily in Ghana because of the juicy investment return. I was surprised that Access bank's earning only dropped by 4% from 2021.
"However, I expect that many Nigerian banks, such as Access, with high exposure to sovereign debt, will start looking at risk in a more holistic way and trade carefully investing in other countries
"But the biggest talking point is dividends. We expected a lower dividend payments but we were surprised that it is 15% higher than last year. In fact dividend payment is the highest across the industry.
List of 45 failed banks in Nigeria and dates of closure
In another report, Legit.ng revealed that in the last 28 years, approximately 46 commercial and merchant banks have closed down for various reasons.
The banks had their licenses revoked by the Central Bank of Nigeria between 1994 and 2006.
United Bank of Africa and Ecobank took control of the two commercial banks that failed.
Source: Legit.ng
