Bank reports rise in settlements, loan book spikes by 5%

Auswide Bank has released its full-year 2018 (FY18) financial results, which revealed that the lender’s home loan settlements increased by $8 million, from $536 million in FY18 to $544 million in FY18. Auswide’s loan book rose by 5 per cent over the FY18 financial year to $2.91 billion.

The bank also delivered an underlying net profit after tax (NPAT) of $17.1 million, jumping 9 per cent from FY17.

Despite other lenders reporting drops, Auswide’s net interest margin increased by 3 basis points to 1.93 per cent.

Commenting on the results, Auswide’s managing director Martin Barrett said: “This is a very strong result which continues the improvement in profitability and shareholder returns we have achieved over the past few years.

“Our underlying cost to income ratio of 63.3 per cent and earnings per share growth are the best in the listed small bank sector.

“We continued to invest in our business with loan processing improvements significantly increasing our growth capability while we have kept costs flat.

“This along with our ongoing work in improving our digital banking capability and end to end process improvements is delivering positive customer experiences.”

Mr Barrett made specific note of the bank’s performance in the competitive home lending space, despite the sharp increase in wholesale funding costs forcing the bank to lift interest rates.

“Our loan book grew at system as we carefully managed our net interest margin during a time of significant competition and volatility in the bank bill swap rates (BBSWs),” he added.

“Disciplined growth in home lending, consumer and business banking will continue to provide support to our net interest margin over the year ahead.”

Mr Barrett added that going forward, Auswide Bank would continue to invest in digital capability that will assist in growth and net interest margin management.

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