Emirates Islamic posts 143 mln dirhams loss for second quarter

Emirates Islamic on Monday (July 20) reported 143.141 million dirhams ($39 million) in losses for the three months ending June 30.

The Shariah-compliant bank posted 154.987 million dirhams in profit for the first-quarter of this year, pushing it into the black with 11.846 million dirhams for the first half of 2020. 

In a “normal” period pre-COVID 19, the bank earned 673.002 million dirhams in net profit for the first half of 2019.

HIGHER IMPAIRMENTS

“The drop in net profit (for the first-half of 2020) is largely attributable to the prudent actions taken by the Bank to create higher impairment on its financing and investment book to cater to the future impact of COVID-19,” Emirates Islamic said in a bourse filing.

Net impairment on financial assets for the second-quarter was 378.894 million dirhams.

This is a deterioration from 206.418 million dirhams in the first-quarter.

The bank’s total net impairment on financial assets for the first half of the year reached 585.312 million dirhams. The figure was 118.208 million dirhams for the same period in 2019.

INCOME

Total operating income for the second-quarter was 498.882 million dirhams, down from 641.167 million dirhams in the first-quarter.

For the six-month period, Emirates Islamic’s total income reached 1.14 billion dirhams, which considering the economic downturn is not far off from the first-half of 2019’s 1.335 billion dirhams.

The bank ended the first six months of this year with 64.2 billion dirhams in assets, 1% lower from the end of 2019.

It said that due to the COVID-19 crisis, it assisted over 35,400 customers defer instalments of 2.09 billion dirhams in the first half of the year.

In better news, the bank’s financing and investing receivables increased by 8% from the end of 2019 to reach 40.4 billion dirhams.

Customer deposits of 45.046 billion dirhams is almost flat from the 45.322 billion dirhams at the end of 2019.  

'CAUTIOUS APPROACH'

“Our financial results for H1 2020 reflect our measured and cautious approach as the UAE eases lockdown restrictions and begins a phased plan towards economic recovery,” said CEO Salah Mohammed Amin.

He added that more customers are now “digitally active” and the bank will “keep enhancing” its digital banking solutions to address customer needs in a “new environment”.

Emirates Islamic is part of the Emirates NBD Group.

© SalaamGateway.com 2020 All Rights Reserved