Another quarter of consistency from HNB
Hatton National Bank (HNB) continued its robust performance by
recording a 32% rise in pre-tax profits to Rs 1,498 million in the six
months to June 2007.
Commenting on the performance, HNB's Managing Director Rajendra
Theagarajah said " We are extremely pleased with such consistent
performance which has been sustained during the past ten successive
quarters.
Our team focus on balancing business growth with profitability,
improving productivity, managing costs, and enhanced asset quality has
contributed towards this performance".
Net interest generated from interest bearing assets has increased by
29% while Non interest income showed a growth of 22%. The six months
have also seen the entire operating expense bill of Rs 4.23 bn being
comfortably met by net interest income from core banking activity. Net
Income including foreign exchan- ge, commission income and investment
income grew by 27% during this six months period led by a surge in
Foreign Exchange trading which grew by 48%.
HNB has maintained reasonable control on expenses with operating
costs increasing by 26%. While recognising the impact of domestic
inflation on expenses, Theagarajah stressed the need for increased focus
on managing cost through better internal efficiencies. In its quest to
improve asset quality, the bank's loan quality has shown steady
improvement with two key performance indicators having improved to 6.9%
and 73.4% respectively in June 2007. |