GIB maintains dividends at $45 million

07 April 1995
FINANCE

The Gulf International Bank (GIB) in Bahrain has announced that it will maintain dividends at $45 million. This is despite a 15 per cent drop in net income to $74.8 million.

The dividend was announced following GIB's eighteenth annual assembly in Riyadh on 27 March, when the bank released its full results for 1994.

The fall in profits was due to a poor performance in trading securities after record earnings in 1993, which affected GIB's parent, the Gulf Investment Corporation (GIC) to a greater extent (see above - MEED 3:2:95).

GIB's assets increased by nearly 6 per cent to $7,574.2 million. The bank has a liquidity ratio of 53.3 per cent. Loans and advances rose by nearly 12 per cent, the emphasis remaining on short-term lending. Interest and fees on loans rose by 22 per cent to $204 million, helping to offset a 62 per cent fall in other income at $24.4 million. Shareholders' equity rose by about 6 per cent to $558.2

million.

'I am very pleased with the core earnings development. I am particularly encouraged by the 9.2 per cent improvement in net interest earnings (to $97.3 million) and the manner in which we have been able to contain our operating costs. All key financial ratios remain satisfactory,' Ghazi Abdul-Jawad, GIB's general manager said. GIB chairman and Bahrain's Finance & National Economy Minister Ibrahim Abdul-Karim said: '1994 has been another successful year for GIB. The bank has continued to develop and employ its specialist skills, market knowledge and international reach to very good effect.'

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