To focus on home market, UAE’s Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank PJSC has started exiting overseas operations in India, Qatar and Kuwait. The bank posted a net profit of AED 4.196 Billion in its nine-month financial results for 2019.
“Following the sale of the majority of our banking portfolio in India to DCB Bank, we are well on track to exit our operations in the Indian market. We have also initiated the process of exiting our operations in Qatar and Kuwait, and have informed the respective authorities accordingly,” said the ADCB in an official statement.
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The group posted a net profit of AED 1.413 billion in the third quarter of 2019, while the nine-month group net profit stood at AED 4.196 billion “with a double-digit annualised return on tangible equity of 11.9%”.
At AED 3.272 billion, the group’s operating income was up by one percent in the third quarter. The operating income for nine-month period stood at AED 9.919 billion, down from AED 10.575 billion last year.
Third-quarter cost to income ratio stood at 35.8 percent, as compared to 39.8 percent in Q2’19, an improvement of 400 basis points quarter on quarter.
The bank had announced a three-way merger with Union National Bank (UNB) and Al Hilal Bank in May this year, creating the Gulf region’s fifth-biggest lender with $110 billion in assets.
The end-to-end integration timeline of the merger has been reduced by half – from 34 months to 17 months, said the ADCB. The complete integration is expected to be completed by the second quarter of 2020.
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“The Bank is moving ahead at a powerful pace with the integration process. Within only five months of the legal merger of ADCB and UNB on 1 May 2019, we combined the branch and ATM networks, and rolled out the ADCB brand across all customer channels. Since early October, we are serving all of our customers, whether former UNB or ADCB, at any of our 72 branches and over 450 ATMs, providing consistent and high-quality service across the whole network. This was a key milestone in providing a unified and enhanced banking experience to over 1 million customers under the ADCB brand,” said Ala’a Eraiqat, Group Chief Executive Officer and Board Member.
“Excluding integration-related costs, pro forma net profit of AED 4.413 billion in the nine-month period was 10% lower year on year. Third-quarter net profit (excluding integration-related costs) of AED 1.520 billion was stable sequentially on the back of higher non-interest income and a tightly managed cost base, coupled with the realisation of merger synergies,” said Deepak Khullar, Group Chief Financial Officer.
