By Staff Reporter
Nedbank Lesotho is to release its financial results that will lay out its performance in the financial year ended December 2021.
This was revealed yesterday during a media briefing held jointly by Nedbank Group chief executive Africa Region Dr Terence Sibiya and Nedbank Lesotho’s managing director Nkau Matete.
The briefing was specifically meant to show Nedbanks’ performance in the African region where it appeared that despite impairments such as Covid-19, the bank performed remarkably well in the financial sector.
Matete said the previous financial results will be released at the end of March 2022. He was optimistic that he results will show positive features as the bank performed well despite the difficult period brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic.
He said the bank came to the rescue of some of its clients who lost their jobs due to the emergence of the pandemic, adding that the customers were given some relief to keep their accounts active.
He said Nedbank Lesotho has improved its banking services as it has demonstrated growth in digital banking services in addition to traditional ways of banking. It is rated as the best in offering internet banking services.
Matete foresaw some future growth prospects for the bank, noting that despite job losses its customer base did not see a steep decline.
In his brief, Sibiya said the Nedbank Group delivered the strong financial performance for the year ended December 2021 as its headline earnings increased by 115 percent to M11.7 billion for the year in review, but lower than the previous year by seven percent.
“Headline earnings growth was driven by significantly lower impairments, a higher interest margin, a recovery in non-interest revenue growth, disciplined expense management and a stronger financial performance from the groups’ associate investment…Pre-provisioning operating profit increased by eight percent,” he said.
Sibiya, who was pleased with Nedbank’s growth in Africa, remarked: “During the year 2021, the group’s balance sheet continued to strengthen as it closed out the resilience phase of its strategic response to the Covid-19 pandemic.”
The Nedbank Group delivered a strong financial performance for the year ended 31 December 2021 as headline earnings increased by 115 percent to R11.7bn, although remaining seven percent below 2019 levels. Headline earnings growth was driven by significantly lower impairments, a higher net interest margin, a recovery in non-interest revenue growth, disciplined expense management and a stronger financial performance from the group’s associate investment in ETI. Pre-provisioning operating profit increased by nine percent.
Nedbank’s strategy is delivered through five strategic value unlocks that include: delivering innovative market-leading client solutions; engaging in ongoing disruptive market activities (underpinned by digital leadership), focusing on areas that create value (strategic portfolio tilt), driving efficient execution (including target operating model enhancements) and creating positive impacts, including delivering on our purpose of using our financial expertise to do good.
Underpinning these strategic value unlocks is the Managed Evolution strategy and technology transformation programme to build a modern, modular and digital IT stack that has reached 85 percent completion and helped deliver a number of wins over the past year:
• The Nedbank Money app, which makes banking more convenient for retail clients, continues to be rated highly on the Apple and Google app stores, with an average client rating of 4,4 (out of five). It is actively used by 1,6 million clients, up by 38% (2020: 1,2 million). Transaction volumes on the Nedbank Money app increased by 54% and transaction values increased by 72% when compared to full-year 2020.
• Digital initiatives helped to increase the number of digitally-active Nedbank retail clients in SA by 11% to 2,3 million (December 2020: 2,1 million). This now represents 64% of main-banked clients (2020: 57% and 2019: 49%).
• Simplified digital client onboarding platforms for individual and juristic (business) clients continue to mature and expand, enabling clients to open FICA-compliant accounts remotely through our employee-assisted and self-service digital channels, by providing a seamless omnichannel experience. The digitising of product sales to individuals currently includes six of Nedbank’s top retail products; transactional products, personal loans, card issuing, home loans, investments and overdrafts, as well as more than 170 services.
• Since its launch in June 2020, Avo (Nedbank’s super app) signed up more than 675 000 consumers (4,7x growth year on year) by December 2021, along with over 20 250 businesses registering and offering their products and services on this e-commerce platform. Product orders continue to grow exponentially, with 3x year on year growth of gross merchandise value. At the start of March 2022, Avo exceeded 1 million clients.
In the 2021 Consulta survey Nedbank achieved the #2 ranking among the five largest South African banks on client satisfaction metrics, with Net Promoter Score (NPS) increasing further to 47. Progress on the strategic portfolio tilt strategy was evident in market share gains in key product areas and main-banked clients, as well as improved levels of cross-sell.
