Societe Generale Ghana safe from 2nd round of DDEP – MD Ouzzani says
Managing Director of Societe Generale Ghana, Hakim Ouzzani, says the bank does not expect to be impacted by the second round of Government’s Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP).
This he notes, is due to the fact that the bank is not exposed to the US dollar local bonds (GHS 6.9bn) and cocoa bills (GHS 8.1bn) that were recently agreed to be restructured by the Government and banks in the country.
“We have already dealt with the first round and its impact on us, but we do not expect to be impacted by the second round because we are not exposed to the debt securities involved which are the dollar local bonds and cocoa bills,” he told norvanreports on Tuesday, as the bank took its turn on the Facts Behind The Figures event held by the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE).
The re-structuring of the cocoa bills and US dollar local bonds forms part of measures by the government to re-structure a larger domestic debt worth GHS 123bn in order to secure the second $600m tranche under the IMF programme.
Speaking further at the event and touching on the issue of recapitalisation by the bank, Mr Ouzzani noted that Societe Generale has no need to recapitalise as it meets all the necessary regulatory capital requirements to operate in the banking sector.
Presenting the company’s financial performance for the 2022 review period, Mr Ouzzani quipped that the bank’s operating income grew to GHS 802m from GHS 636m recording a year-on-year increase of 26%.
Profit after tax of the bank declined to GHS 109m in 2022 from GHS 184m in 2021 posting a year-on-year 41% fall in profit mainly as a result of the DDEP.
“Given the economic difficulties we found ourselves in 2022, I would say that this was a good profit performance,” he added.
The Capital Adequacy Ratio (CAR) of the Bank in the first quarter of 2023 stood at 14.2%, a decline from the previous year’s CAR of 16%.
Speaking further, Mr Ouzzani noted that, Societe Generale over a five-year period has more than doubled its loans to businesses from GHS 1.6bn in 2018 to GHS 3.2bn in the first quarter of 2023.
Additionally, deposits at the bank by customers within the same five-year period have grown from GHS 2.1bn in 2018 to GHS 4.7bn in Q1 2023.
According to him, Societe Generale has one of the highest loan-to-deposit ratio in the country with over 80% of its deposits going to support businesses in the country through loans.
