FSDH Merchant Bank’s shareholders approve N2.60 billion dividend

Shareholders of FSDH Merchant Bank has endorsed the bank’s recommended N2.60 billion dividends, culminating to 93.20 kobo per share to every investor of the bank for the 2015 financial year.

Speaking at the yearly general meeting of the bank in Lagos at the weekend, the shareholders commended the bank for its improved performance during the year under review, especially the increase in dividend payout, urging the bank to work out modalities that would help reduce expenses.

They also advised the management to invest in more high yielding investment instruments aside the conventional ones in order to increase shareholders’ value in the current financial year.

The group has posted a profit after tax of  N4.09 billion in 2015 operations, a 34.98 per cent rise over N3.03 billion achieved during the corresponding period in 2014.

At the group’s level, a profit before tax of N4.72 billion was achieved, representing an increase of 29.67 percent over the profit of N3.64 billion posted in 2014.

The Chairman of the bank, Osaro Isokpan, assured shareholders that the bank would continue to take advantage of emerging opportunities in industry to grow the business and increase profitability.

He added that that the bank would continue to exercise caution in its risk assets creation and management in order to ensure that they build a portfolio of risk assets that would ‘stand the test of time.’

The Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of the bank, Rilwan Belo-Osagie told stakeholders that the bank would continue to maximise shareholder’s value by constantly realigning its operations and staying ahead of trends in the industry.

“We intend to continue to harness the opportunities we identify in carefully selected industries while continuing with our conservative approach of building a portfolio of risk assets that would be enduring.

“We will continue to maximise shareholders’ value by constantly realigning our operations and also harnessing business opportunities as they arise. We also take this opportunity to thank our stakeholders and clients for their confidence in FSDH and the continued support and patronage,” he added.