FNBB to Open More Branches And Target Mining (27 August 2007 )

First National Bank of Botswana (FNBB) on Friday warned its competitors that for the next few months, it will focus on accelerating its expansion programme and on making itself more visible to the growing mining industry.

The warning was made as the bank unveiled its year-end results to June 30, 2007 that feature a healthy balance sheet that shows a total asset growth of 15.8 percent at P8.4 billion from P7.2 billion in the corresponding period last year.

The robust balance sheet is attributed to a 13.1 percent increase in advances driven by the bank's property finance division, retail banking and WesBank, FNBB's car finance division.
The bank's property division is currently at par with the Botswana Building Society (BBS) as a result of vigorous mining developments, particularly in the northern parts of Botswana.
The growth is also inspite of increasing costs the bank has incurred from an aggressive expansion programme.

At the unveiling of the results at the Gaborone Sun, hale and hearty executives said their expansion programme is meant to increase "our footprint" and to introduce new businesses to serve specific customers' needs.

"We are to open more branches; we will make an announcement soon," Danny Zandamela, FNBB Chief Executive Officer, told journalists.

"We will also make ourselves available to the mining sector," he added.

Under the current expansion programme, FNBB has already opened branches in the resort town of Kasane and Riverwalk Plaza in Gaborone and added Islamic Banking and Cellphone Banking to its products.

But Zandamela did not want to specify places targeted for opening more branches.

The new branches will pit FNBB against competitors like Barclays Bank that already has a rural area outreach programme through its Express Branches in places like Tutume and Tlokweng.
FNBB management disclosed that its expansion programme has resulted in cost escalations of 22.7 percent, although it said that is in line with projections and that the cost-to-income ratio remains the lowest in the market at 35.4 percent.

"However, this growth in operating expenses is in line with management expectations as it gives us access to new revenue streams and much of it is non recurring", the bank's financial statements say in part.