Ecobank Ghana has for the fourth time won a prestigious banking award in this year. The bank emerged Best Bank in the Financial Services Sector (Banking) at the just-ended 6th AGI awards, which were held at the Banquet Hall of the State House.
With this, Ecobank has swept all the major awards organised locally and internationally this year. This makes Ecobank the most decorated and most successful banking institution in Ghana, having previously won the CIMG Bank of the Year, CIG Best Bank of the Year, and Euromoney Best Bank of the Year. This feat is unparalleled, as no single bank has annexed all these key awards in a single year.
These achievements have largely been as a result of the bank’s stellar performances over the years, and for the 2016 financial year in particular. Ecobank closed the year with owners’ equity of over GH¢964million, total assets of GH¢8.1billion, profit before tax of GH¢462.6million, with a 15.29 percent capital adequacy ratio.
The bank has over the years made good returns to its shareholders with return on average equity (ROAE) and return on average assets (ROAA) averaging above 35 percent and 4 percent respectively over the past five years. The year 2016 saw the bank post ROAE of 35.4 percent and 4.4 percent ROAA.
To reciprocate the love and kindness of society and the environment, the bank pledges to continue conducting its business ethically while making substantial annual contributions toward helping to uplift the less-privileged, less-endowed and deprived people, institutions, communities and the planet, as a way of discharging its corporate social responsibility (CSR).
In pursuit of this, the bank accordingly increased its CSR disbursements to GH¢3.4million in 2016, which was 19 percent higher than the amount spent in the prior year. Ecobank’s CSR is focused mainly on education, health, financial inclusion and socio-cultural events and community development programmes.
Going forward, the bank intends to continue leveraging its biggest balance sheet size to introduce more convenient, accessible and reliable products and services in line with its mission. Ecobank will also intensively drive its digital agenda, which has so far seen the bank release four innovative phone-enabled services, which include: the Ecobank Mobile APP, Scan + Pay QR Code, TBill4All, and the Ecobank Xpress Account.
These products enable customers to do banking on the go, saving them much-needed time to concentrate on their businesses while at the same time decreasing their transactional costs for banking.
