Staff Reporter

KARACHI: The Board of Directors of Bank Alfalah Limited (BAFL), in its meeting held on July 28, 2022, approved the bank’s financial results for the six months ended June 30, 2022.

The bank announced profit after tax of PKR 8.703 billion, up by 25.5%. EPS stood at Rs. 4.90 (Jun 21: Rs. 3.90). The Board has approved an interim cash dividend of Rs. 2.5 (last year: Rs. 2.0) per share.

The Bank’s deposit base stood at Rs. 1.318 trillion at the end of Q2’22, with YoY growth of 28.6%. The Bank continues to outpace the industry in deposit growth driven by a strong momentum in its current deposits which showed market leading growth of 25.7% YoY. Moreover, BAFL’s CA mix at 45.5%, remains one of the strongest in the industry which has been a result of the bank’s continued focus on market penetration serving more and more customer segments and effective branch expansion strategy.

Furthermore, despite challenging market fundamentals, the Bank’s credit performance was strong in the first half of 2022 with Gross Advances reaching Rs. 755.340 billion, showing a growth of 18.3% YoY. In anticipation of expected credit headwinds caused by the current economic stress, the Bank has taken an additional general provision of Rs. 2.750 billion during the quarter and subjectively downgraded a few customers showing credit weakening. Accordingly, the coverage ratio stands at 109.8% while the infection ratio remained stable at 3.5%.

The Bank remains adequately capitalized, and CAR was well above the regulatory requirement with 14.64% as at June 30, 2022.

This momentum will continue, despite the prevailing uncertainty, since the Bank is committed to its strategy of growth, customer centric approach and innovation.