CRDB BANK SHAREHOLDERS DIVIDEND INCREASES BY 2%

CRDB Bank shareholders approved a dividend payment of TZS 14 per share proposed by the board during the Annual General meeting (AGM) held in Arusha over the weekend, which is 2% from 2012 dividends.

The shareholders also retained PricewaterhouseCoopers as the bank’s auditors for the financial year 2014. This follows the bank’s impressive performance in the year ended 31st December 2013 after posting a TZS 122.7 bilion pre-tax profit, which is a 13% increase compared to TZS 108 billion posted in the year ended 31st December 2012.

CRDB Bank Board Chairman, Mr. Martin Mmari, attributed the growth in profit to the revival of foreign exchange related income to its normal trend, growth in net interest income and fees and commissions coupled with strong costs management.

“We are focused on ensuring high shareholders returns as reflected by earnings per share and partly by the dividend paid per share. We recommended a TZS 14 per share and I am happy to note that the same has been approved by the shareholders,” said Mr. Mmari.

“The total amount of dividend recommended is TZS 30.5 billion, as compared to TZS 26.1 billion paid out in 2012 and this signals a strong and progressive growth in earnings per share (EPS) and dividends per share (DPS),” said Mr. Mmari.

CRDB Bank Managing Director, Dr. Charles Kimei, addressing the shareholders noted that the bank has witnessed improved performance with significant growth in customer deposits especially from government institutions and a growing customer base as well as an increasing loan portfolio.

“Our interest income rose to TZS 236.2 billion in 2013 compared to TZS 206.1 billion recorded in 2012,” said Dr. Kimei. “The loan impairment remained a challenge to the bank and we are steadfastly working to reduce it to not more than 5% of the loan portfolio which stood at TZS 1.807 billion as at 31st December 2013,” noted Dr. Kimei.

The bank’s net interest income after loan impairment charges increased to TZS 179 billion in 2012 from TZS 122.2 billion in 2011. On the other hand, fees and commissions income grew to TZS 75.2 billion in 2012 up from TZS 62.8 billion in 2011.

Dr. Kimei added that the bank’s venture into Burundi has so far met the bank’s initial projections, despite being in operations for merely 2 years.

“The Burundi subsidiary’s deposits grew from TZS 1.1 billion at end of December 2012 to TZS 15.9 billion in 2013, also total assets grew from TZS 16.2 billion to TZS 31.8 billion. These are very impressive returns from our first ever investment venture outside Tanzania,” stressed Dr. Kimei.