There are clear signs that Stanbic Bank Malawi, a subsidiary of South Africa’s Standard Bank, is over the hump of an ambitious restructuring, not least because profits rebounded from just K1m ($7200) in 2004 to K221m in 2005. During the same period assets were up 18%.
“The bank has revamped its entire strategy, engaged new staff and focused on up-skilling existing staff. The result has been a substantial increase in year-on-year revenues for the bank,” says managing director Philip Odera.
The judges also noted the sharp improvement in the NPL ratio, which was slashed from 15% to 7.8% between 2004 and 2005. “There has been an aggressive drive to avoid bad debts and collect existing ones. And we keep improving – the NPL ratio now stands at 3.8%,” says Mr Odera.
That same pursuit of improvement has seen a steady gains in operational efficiency, with the cost-to-income ratio falling from 99.5% in 2004 to 87.4% in 2005 to 68% presently, according to Mr Odera.
The bank has implemented several new initiatives to increase growth, including further investment in the bank’s electronic banking platform.
