Sharjah Islamic Bank’s Net Profits Increase By 26.7% in 2021

Sharjah Islamic Bank announced an increase in its net profit by 26.7%, as the net profit amounted to $139.94 million in 2021 compared to $110.46 million the previous year.

This reflected in an increase in its operating profits by 21.9%, which amounted to $231.56 million in 2021 compared to $189.91 million in 2020.

The bank’s board of directors agreed to propose a cash dividend of 8% of the capital, provided that this proposal would be submitted to the general assembly for discussion and approval.

Despite the partial recovery from the repercussions of the COVID-19 and the continuation of hedging policy followed by the bank to meet the challenges resulting from the operational conditions, the net impairment provisions amounted to $66.55 million compared to $69.63 million for the same period.

The growth in the bank’s net profits indicates the strong performance in all its business units.  

The bank maintained the level of general and administrative expenses compared to the previous year, reaching $157 million at the end of 2021 compared to $152.84 million in 2020 as a result of the policies adopted to control costs.

The balance sheet of the bank showed an increase in total assets by 2.57% to reach $14.97 billion as on 31 December 2021, compared to $14.59 53.6 billion in 2020.

The bank also continued to maintain a strong liquidity ratio to be used for future opportunities, reaching $3.89 billion, at a rate of 26.1% to the total assets, compared to $3.05 billion or 20.9% of the total assets in 2020, and the financing to deposits ratio reached 75.4% reflecting the strength and durability liquidity available to the bank.

Sukuk payable decreased by $490 million to reach $1.01 billion at the end of 2021, compared to $1.5 billion the same period in 2020, as a result of paying $500 million in the third quarter through the bank’s own sources, which indicates that it enjoys an excellent level of surplus liquidity. .

The bank continued to diversify its financing portfolio in various economic sectors and follow a wise credit policy that takes into account all developments accompanying the pandemic and its impact on financial markets, as the total customer financings stabilized at an amount of $7.89 billion dirhams, a slight decrease of $70.64 million from the level of at the end of 2020.

The bank was able to attract a larger volume of customer deposits during the year, as deposits increased by 14.5% to reach a total of $10.48 billion compared to $9.15 billion at the end of 2020.

Sharjah Islamic Bank has a strong capital base, as the total shareholders’ equity at the end of December 2021 amounted to $2.1 billion which represents 16.3% of the bank’s total assets. Thus, the bank maintained a high capital adequacy ratio in accordance with Basel III decisions at its highest levels in recent times, reaching 20.84%.

Thus, the return on assets and the return on equity increased to 0.95% and 6.7%, respectively, compared to 0.81% and 5.35% at the end of 2020.