Fidelity Bank makes inroad

The Fidelity Bank Limited recorded a 58 per cent growth in its total assets from GH¢650 million in 2010 to GH¢1.03 billion in 2011.

The Managing Director of the bank, Mr Edward Effah, disclosed this figure at the bank’s annual general meeting held in Accra.

He affirmed that despite the increased competitiveness of the financial sector in 2011, the bank delivered superior financial performance without compromising its standards of service, risk management and its disciplined approach to doing business.

The total operating income of the bank also grew from GH¢46 million in 2010 to GH¢80 million in 2011, indicating a growth of 74 per cent. Profit before tax grew from GH¢7.1 million in 2010 to GH¢14.6 million. This represents a 106 per cent increase over the previous year.

Mr Effah stated that 2011 had been the fifth year of the bank and its affairs were prudently and diligently steered to deliver a profitable business that had touched several people.

He assured shareholders, customers of the bank and Ghanaians that the bank would continue to actively engage in the evaluation and analysis of the environment regarding the available and emerging credit opportunities to continue to improve and maintain one of the lowest non performing loan (NPL) ratios in the industry.

According to him, the bank is now active in all aspects of banking as well as offered an array of products that ranged from microfinance to some of the biggest syndicated facilities which drives the country’s economy in health, energy and defense.

With a balance sheet in excess of GH¢1 billion, 40 branches and 49 ATMs in nine out of the 10 regions of Ghana, he expressed optimism that the bank would end this year with a total of 60 branches in all the regions.

“We envisage a bright future in which we will remain ahead of market trends by delighting our customers with innovative products and world-class services in all spheres of our banking relationship”, he added.

Mr William Panford Bray, Board Chairman of the bank, noted that they expected the economy to grow as government spending and payments increased in view of the upcoming elections.

That, he said, would have its benefits in the banking industry and “Fidelity bank will be poised to take advantage of these”.

Due to the extensive branch expansion and customer loyalty programmes, the bank increased its customer base from 120,000 to 250,000, which had facilitated the bank’s mobilisation of deposits to the tune of GHC¢896 million, a 64 per cent increase from 2010’s figure of GH¢548 million.

He stated that the bank needed to raise its stated capital to GH¢60 million by the end of the year as part of Bank of Ghana’s minimum capitalisation requirement.

The board, according to him, therefore recommended the issuance of additional Preference Shares this year and an IPO next year, in order to raise more than what was required.

He commended the shareholders, stakeholders, directors, management and the entire staff of the bank for their diverse contributions towards the success of the bank.

He assured the general public that the Fidelity bank would continue to focus its corporate social responsibility on education and health care to help develop the country to become a better place to live in.