Nedbank’s Africa Regions (NAR) business delivered a good set of results driven by a good performance from our Exchange Traded Instruments (ETI) investment and rebound from the SADC operations, the banking group announced.
HE increased by greater than 100% to R594m, which is significantly higher than the R12m reported in 2020, with ROE improving to 9,3% from 0,2% in 2020, in performance which reflects the impact of significantly lower impairments, an increase in NII of 14% to R1 448m and a strong recovery in associate income from ETI with related HE increasing to R523m (2020: R153m).
“I am pleased that the business across SADC has improved in key client metrics especially in client experience: We are #1 in NPS in Namibia and Mozambique. We have the highest loyalty scores in three of our markets (Eswatini, Namibia and Zimbabwe), and we are also in the top two in brand sentiment scores in four of the markets (Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe) we operate in,” NAR Managing Executive, Dr Terence Sibiya said.
“We grew our digitally active clients, who now make up 54% of our active retail client base. We also significantly grew transactional volumes on our apps, online banking and prepaid value-added services (PVAS): Nedbank Money App (Africa) has proven to be the channel of choice for our clients with payment and transfer volumes up 35% year on year and value[1]added services (airtime, data, prepaid electricity, etc) up 26% year on year.”
Performance highlights:
Impairments declined by 62% to R168m, with a CLR of 72 bps (from 185 bps in 2020), which is at the lower end of its TTC target range of 75 bps to 100 bps, driven by improved collections, recoveries, and subdued growth in the loan portfolio.
Despite an improved H2 2021, NIR for full-year 2021 declined marginally by 2% to R1 431m due to subdued transactional activity and lower foreign exchange translation gains.
The third wave of the pandemic in H1 2021 saw extended lockdowns across the regions, which resulted in lower economic activity.
Expenses were well managed and up by only 3% to R2 088m off a low base in the prior year.
Our SADC operations generated an HE of R71m, up by >100% from a loss of R141m in 2020
