Guaranty Trust Bank Plans East Africa Expansion

 
The Chief Executive Officer of Guaranty Trust Bank Plc, Segun Agbaje, has said the bank would open units in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda as it seeks to expand in East Africa.

According to Agbaje, the bank will “acquire lenders that are not that large, but profitable in those countries in the short term.”

Agbaje said the Bank, which is currently operating in six countries outside Nigeria, is targeting the East African nations owing to their “appreciable gross domestic product, growing investments and ease of doing business.

The bank had emerged the first Nigerian bank to cross the N100 billion Profit Before Tax milestone from continuing operations at both bank and group levels.

The bank in its just released 2012 financial result posted a profit before tax of N103 billion the first of its kind in the Nigerian banking history.

The results for its year ended December 2012 showed that the bank recorded a 66 per cent rise in its profit before tax, just as it made an improvement in its gross earnings which grew to N221.9 billion. Its profit after taxation was also up by 69 per cent from N51.7 billion in 2011 to N87.3 billion at the end of its 2012 financial year.