Africa-Press – South-Africa. FirstRand, SA’s largest banking group by market value, raised its dividend by double digits after reporting robust annual results on the back of a solid operational performance.
The Johannesburg-headquartered group said normalised earnings attributable to ordinary shareholders rose 12% to R36.7 billion for the year to end June, allowing its board to declare an annual dividend of 384c, a 12% year-on-year increase.
The group, which is valued at R384 billion on the JSE, said its results reflected the quality and resilience of its underlying businesses, which include FNB, RMB, WesBank and Aldermore in the UK.
FirstRand’s overall credit loss ratio of 78 basis points for the period, which though higher than the 56 basis points reported the previous year, remained below the group’s through-the-cycle range. The group’s return on equity (ROE) came in at 21.2%, staying at the upper end of its 18% to 22% target.
“These strong results are a direct outcome of key decisions taken at the beginning of the current macroeconomic cycle,” FirstRand CEO Alan Pullinger said in a statement. “The credit performance stands out. This is testament to the post-pandemic origination approach, and particularly pleasing given the higher-than-expected interest rate and inflationary cycles experienced across all jurisdictions.”
FirstRand’s results come at a time when most of its retail banking rivals are seeing higher impairments as customers struggle to make loan repayments due to surging food and fuel costs that have driven interest rates to their highest since 2009. The Reserve Bank has hiked its benchmark lending rate by 475 basis points (bps) since it began tightening monetary policy in November 2021 in an attempt to curb inflation, which only fell back within its 3% to 6% tolerance range in June after remaining above target for 13 consecutive months.
Despite FirstRand saying the current interest rate and inflation cycle has been more aggressive than it initially expected, it has still gradually increased loan origination over the past 18-months back to pre-pandemic levels. Though the group’s credit loss ratio remains within acceptable levels, bad loans have still increased, driven by its retail-focused operations in SA as well as its UK businesses.
Lending pressure
The group’s stage 3 non-performing loans (NPLs), which are typically defined as those that are more than 90 days in arrears, increased to R57.4 billion in the financial year, up from R50.9 billion the prior year. However, these still only constituted 3.8% of FirstRand’s core lending advances in the period, down from 3.88% in the previous financial year, underscoring the resilience of the group’s operations in the face of severe consumer headwinds.
FNB’s credit impairment charge increased 37% to R6.74 billion with the retail lender’s credit loss ratio rising to 132 basis points, from 104 basis points. This was largely due to growth in loans and the consequent increase in arrears in its retail personal loans, card and overdrafts portfolios, though FirstRand said this was in line with historical trends.
Non-performing loans at FNB climbed to 6.59% of total advances, up from 6.45% the previous year, though this was partly offset by robust collection efforts across all its lending portfolios. Even so, FNB remained the star performer in the FirstRand stable by contributing 60%, or R21.9 billion, of the group’s R36.7 billion normalised earnings.
Vehicle financing unit WesBank contributed 5% or R1.86 billion to the group’s normalised earnings, a 16% improvement thanks to robust auto sales. Nevertheless, FirstRand warned that market activity at WesBank slowed down in the second half of the financial year, as customers struggled with affordability due to inflationary and interest rate pressures.
RMB, the group’s corporate and investment banking unit, headed up by Emrie Brown, accounted for 25%, or R9.15 billion, of the group’s normalised earnings thanks to a strong performance from its Africa portfolio, which mitigated a softer performance from its South African operations due to higher credit provisions, a weaker performance in its financial markets trading activities and above-inflation staff cost increases.
The investment banking unit’s total profit before tax rose 9% in the year to R12.6 billion; however, on a segmental basis its SA arm saw after-tax profit drop 4% to about R8.7 billion. By contrast, RMB’s broader African business shot the lights out with a 55% jump in after-tax profit to R3.95 billion.
FirstRand’s UK operations, which include Aldermore Bank and vehicle financier MotoNovo, contributed about 9% or R3.35 billion to normalised earnings. Despite a challenging macroeconomic backdrop in the UK, characterised by strong inflationary pressures, the businesses still delivered profit growth while overall advances grew 2% to £15.6 billion (R368 billion). However, FirstRand still had to book an impairment charge of £90.4 million for the UK business, an increase of 57% on the prior year, though it said this was in line with its expectations given the uncertain economic outlook in the UK.
Despite FirstRand’s solid performance in the past financial year, Pullinger struck a cautious tone on the year ahead, saying uncertainty remains high. While he believes interest rates and SA and other African jurisdictions where the group operates have probably peaked, FirstRand only expects borrowing costs to start falling in mid-2024 while in the UK rates are likely to rise further.
“This environment means corporate advances growth will moderate from current levels but are expected to remain resilient. Retail portfolios probably soften on the back of lower demand,” Pullinger said. “The group’s credit loss ratio in the coming year is expected to marginally exceed the mid-point of the through-the-cycle range, which is a pleasing performance given the strain consumers and households are feeling at the moment.”
FirstRand’s shares were down more than 3% in midday trade on Thursday but are still about 10% for the year to date.
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