Lahore (Muhammad Yasir) Faysal Bank Limited recently conducted a virtual corporate briefing session. Through the session the Bank’s Chief Financial Officer, Syed Majid Ali briefed the analyst community and shareholders about the Bank’s business strategy, financial performance and its outlook.
The Bank has made significant progress on its strategy of conversion to an Islamic bank. 87% of the Bank’s branches are now offering dedicated sharia compliant financial solutions. During 2020, despite wide ranging business and operational challenges posed by COVID-19, the Bank converted 65 branches to Islamic which is a testament to its commitment of Islamic conversion.
The Bank continues to increase outreach to its customers and opened 21 new sharia compliant branches during the previous year. Alongside investment in brick-and-mortar infrastructure, the Banks is aggressively working on enhancing its suite of digital offerings.
In terms of financial performance, FABL posted profit after tax of Rs. 6.5 billion for the year ended December 31, 2020, as compared to Rs. 6.0 billion last year. Islamic banking business contributed 40% share of profit.
The Bank’s net advances portfolio stood at Rs. 318 billion as at December 31, 2020 out of which 60% of the portfolio is Islamic. The deposit closed at Rs. 541 billion registering a healthy annual growth of 18.1%.
Faysal Assets Management Limited (FABL’s subsidiary), turned a corner and posted profit after tax of Rs. 140 million during 2020 after incurring losses for a long time. FAML is assigned asset management rating of AM2. VIS, the rating agency has recently revised outlook on rating from ‘Stable’ to ‘Positive’. The revision in rating outlook reflects improving market share, experienced top management and support from parent. Assets Under Management have shown remarkable growth of Rs. 39 billion from Rs. 7.8 billion to Rs. 47 billion since acquisition of control by FABL in November 2018.
