KUALA LUMPUR: RHB Bank Bhd posted a net profit of RM701.34 million for the second quarter ended June 30, 2021 on higher total income and lower operating expenses compared to RM400.77 million for the same period a year ago.
It is to be noted that last year the quarter was impacted by a net modification loss impact.
Revenue was RM2.93 billion, down from RM3.26 billion posted previously.
For the first half of 2021, net profit stood at RM1.35 billion versus RM971.65 million in 2020, while revenue slipped to RM5.83 billion from RM6.47 billion previously, it said in a filing with Bursa Malaysia.
“The group’s financial performance for the first half of the year demonstrates our resilience to record growth and the strength of our fundamentals, including our ability to sustain strong capital and liquidity positions despite the challenging operating environment,” said the bank.
It has declared an interim dividend of 15 sen per share, equivalent to a payout ratio of 45.1 per cent. The interim dividend consists of cash payout of 5.0 sen per share and an electable portion under Dividend Reinvestment Plan of 10 sen per share.
The bank’s total assets for the group increased by 4.1 per cent to RM282.3 billion as at June 30, 2021 from December last year. Net assets per share was RM6.86, with shareholders’ equity at RM27.5 billion as at June 30, 2021.
“Our capital position remains strong; the group’s Common Equity Tier-1 (CET-1) and total capital ratio stood at 16.8 per cent and 19.3 per cent respectively.”
The group’s gross loans and financing grew by 5.7 per cent year-on-year to RM191.0 billion, mainly supported by growth in mortgage, auto finance, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and Singapore. Domestic loans and financing grew 4.1 per cent year-on-year.
The group’s domestic loan market share stood at 9.0 per cent as at end-June 2021, it said.
Gross impaired loans was RM3.1 billion as at June 30, 2021, with a gross impaired loans ratio of 1.63 per cent compared with RM3.4 billion and 1.87 per cent respectively as at June 30, 2020.
Loan loss coverage ratio for the group, excluding regulatory reserves, remained strong at 124.1 per cent as at end-June 2021.
Customer deposits increased by 8.1 per cent year-on-year to RM215.6 billion, predominantly attributed to current account saving account (CASA) growth of 10.8 per cent, and fixed and money market time deposits of 7.6 per cent .
CASA composition stood at 29.3 per cent as at June 30, 2021.
Liquidity coverage ratio remained healthy at 141.8 per cent .
“The banking sector, overall, is projected to remain resilient, from the liquidity and capital perspective, to support growth and provide relief to affected borrowers. Our expected credit losses provision remains conservative, having done proactive provisioning since last year.
“On the monetary front, the overnight policy rate is expected to remain stable for the rest of the year,” it said.
Meanwhile RHB Banking Group managing director Datuk Khairussaleh Ramli said the bank may not be able to achieve its target of 11.5 per cent return on equity (ROE) set under its five-year strategy plan known as FIT22, which will end next year.
Expecting the ROE to be between 10 per cent and 11.5 per cent as the plan ended, he said, however, the bank may be able to achieve most of its other targets set in the programme.
“Given the pandemic and the impact of the lockdown, we may not not be able to achieve our ROE of 11.5 per cent. We have recovered this year, as far as the ROE is concerned,” he told a virtual media briefing on the bank’s first-half financial performance today.
“Our ROE has gone up at about 10 per cent and hopefully we can close at that level by the end of the year. We still have about one more year before our FIT22 end. We hope to be able to further improve our ROE but we think that we may not achieve that target (set earlier),” he said. - Bernama
