Bank of Ceylon records Rs. 20 bn PBT in 2012

Shirajiv SIRIMANE

Financial and business highlights for 2012

In a span of six years, assets, deposits, loans and shareholder’s equity have tripled and profits up by seven fold.

Hold’s market leadership in assets, deposits, profits, inward remittances, NRFC deposits, trade finance, shareholder’s equity and treasury operations.

Rated No 1 Brand in the country by Brand Finance Lanka for the past four consecutive years

Fulfillment of 2009 corporate target One10Twelve. Achieved 1 trillion balance sheet in May, seven months ahead of schedule. Became the first institution and first bank in Sri Lanka to have a trillion rupee balance sheet.

First bank in Sri Lanka to successfully raise US $ 500 million through a listed senior unsecured bond in May 2012 from the international market. Bond was oversubscribed nearly eight times proving great success.

Bank’s rupee debenture issue of Rs. 6 billion was successfully concluded in November

Came in Banker’s prestigious top 1000 bank list in the world.

Expanded share of assets from 21 % in 2007 to 25 % in 2012

Now has well over 1,100 service points including branches, extension offices and ATMS islandwide; 1,000th service point opened in Puthukudiyiruppu (Northern Province) in July this year.

Have more than 10 SME Centres in the seven provinces

Set up Yalpanam Dairy Ltd in Kilinochchi

Set up Thurusaviya Loan scheme for rubber smallholders

Have financed over Rs 130 billion development projects in Northern and Eastern Provinces after the war

Bank of Ceylon will become the only entity in both the government and private sector in Sri Lanka to achieve a profit (PBT) of Rs. 20 billion for 2012. Chairman, Dr. Gamini Wickramasinghe said that Bank of Ceylon also became the first bank in Sri Lanka to have Rs. one trillion in assets. He said that the bank has been going from strength to strength and said that their next target would be to attract one trillion of savings. He said that when this is achieved very soon, they can lend more and this would help the bank to make the second trillion of assets by 2014.

The chairman said that they also played a major role towards the development of the North and East and had provided over Rs. 140 billion as credit for the SME and Micro sector since the end of the war. “We have been in the North East for over 60 years,” he added.

Chairman also announced that he would relinquish as the Head of BOC from January 8.

He said that the new management should look at venturing overseas as he sees tremendous potential there. “We hold over 25 % of banking assets in Sri Lanka while the other 23 banks share the rest. If we focus on a rapid expansion plan in Sri Lanka it would be unfair for small time banks.” Commenting as too why he decided to step down he said that he had achieved all his targets by last May and he wanted a break from this busy schedule. “there were no other issues or any other influence for this decision,” he said. He said lending to the government as well as to the North- East have been very profitable.

He said that looking back at his tenure of seven years he can be happy that he was able to take Bank of Ceylon to a new level and gain reputation both locally and internationally.