BIMB's Q3 earnings up 30% on writeback of allowances for impairment

PETALING JAYA: BIMB Holdings Bhd's net profit for the third quarter ended Sept 30, 2017 grew 30.5% to RM183.43 million from RM140.61 million a year ago mainly due to net writeback of allowances for impairment against a net allowance charged for impairment in the corresponding quarter in 2016.
Its revenue jumped 4% to RM912.74 million compared with RM874.54 million in the previous year's corresponding quarter.
For the nine months period, BIMB's net profit grew 12.1% to RM470.20 million from RM419.57 a year ago mainly contributed by a net write-back of allowances for impairment recovered against a net allowance charged in the corresponding period in 2016.
Its revenue rose 5% to RM2.78 billion compared with RM2.65 billion in the previous year's nine months.
This translates to an after-tax return on equity of 15.2%, outpacing most of its peers in the industry.
Net asset per share improved to RM2.81 as at end September 2017 compared with RM2.44 as at end December 2016 and earnings per share rose to 28.81 sen compared with 26.47 sen in the same corresponding period in 2016.
An interim single tier dividend of up to RM229.3 million or 14.0 sen per share was proposed by the directors of BHB for the nine months period. It was also proposed that the dividend reinvestment plan be made applicable to the entire proposed interim single tier dividend.
Bank Islam continued to maintain its financing growth with net financing assets recording a year-on-year (yoy) growth of 8.0% to reach RM40.1 billion as at end September 2017.
As at end of September 2017, customer deposits and investment accounts (IA) stood at RM46.1 billion with a yoy increase of 4.9%. It saw a yoy increase of RM1.7 billion, from RM2.6 billion as at end September 2016 to RM4.3 billion as at end September 2017.
The current and savings accounts ratio as at end September 2017 stood at 32.2%.
Bank Islam's gross impaired financing ratio was 1.07% as at end September 2017.
Bank Islam is expected to continue its focus on the 3D, which are deposits, defensive strategy -- striking the right balance between assets growth and asset quality; and becoming digitally immersed. It will also continue to manage liquidity and deploy capital efficiently in its operations.
For Takaful Malaysia, the higher profit was attributable to higher net wakalah fee income arising from the robust business growth in the general takaful business.
For 2017, Takaful Malaysia will continue to emphasise the four core areas of customer reach, operational agility, cost competitiveness and stakeholder confidence to increase its overall market shares and continuously improving shareholders’ value.
Takaful Malaysia is poised to sustain its position as the market leader in the family takaful business.
BIMB's share price closed unchanged at 4.30 with some 900 shares changing hands.