TOUGH YEAR, SMART CEO: Anne Juuko shakes off a tough 2020; leads growth on Stanbic Bank’s key fundamentals

• Loans and advances grew by 27% from UGX 2.8 trillion (2019) to UGX 3.6 trillion (2020)
• Customer deposits increased by 16% from UGX 4.7 trillion (2019) to UGX 5.4 trillion (2020)
• Profit After Tax was UGX 242 Billion (2020) down from UGX 259 Billion (2019) largely due to the impact of Covid-19 Pandemic on client business.
• Invested UGX 3.9 billion (2020) in Corporate Social Investments for communities, a 70% increase from UGX 2.3 billion (2019). 

2020 was a year for many firsts for Anne Juuko.

She in March 2020 assumed leadership of Stanbic Bank, Uganda’s largest bank with almost 30% market share. But it was also her first time as a Chief Executive ever. Hardly had she settled in than the country, in late March through to the biggest part of 2020 went under a national lockdown.

As the country’s largest bank, risk exposure would come naturally. But if 2020 performance results are anything to go by, it appears, Anne Juuko has perhaps passed the hardest test of her career and her first year as Stanbic Chief Executive, posting growth amidst adversity.

Results released today, show the bank posted a profit of UGX242 billion. Although this is 6.8% lower than the UGX253 billion made in 2019, it is still a huge milestone compared to the challenges of 2020.

More importantly, the bank posted key growth on other fundamentals, such as customer deposits that grew from UGX 4.7 trillion in 2019 to UGX 5.4 trillion in 2020. Growth in deposits, powered, an increase in loans and advances- by 27% year on year from UGX 2.8 trillion to UGX 3.6 trillion as the bank provided the much-needed new credit to key sectors in the economy at height of the pandemic. 

To complement government measures to offer relief to customers amidst the pandemic, Stanbic Bank also lowered the prime lending rate in tandem with the Central Bank Rate (CBR), from 18% to 16%, foregoing UGX26 billion in interest earnings.

LEFT-RIGHT: Dr. Haruna Mawanda – CE Flyhub Technologies, Andrew Mashanda – CE Stanbic Uganda Holdings Ltd (SUHL), Japheth Kato – Board Chairman SUHL, Anne Juuko – CE Stanbic Bank, Jorum Ongura – SBG Securities Uganda Ltd and Spencer Sabiti – CE Stanbic Properties Ltd. Mr. Mashanda SUHL was finalising the restructuring process to enhance its value offerings, meet the needs of clients and increase value for stakeholders.

Commenting about the 2020 performance, Andrew Mashanda, Chief Executive of Stanbic Uganda Holdings Ltd said: “2020 was quite a challenging year given the impact of the pandemic across the globe. Despite the tough period, Stanbic Uganda Holdings has demonstrated resilience and delivered a commendable performance.”

On her part, Juuko said: “It was an incredibly difficult year for the entire economy, but Stanbic has shown that it remains a strong and well-capitalised bank committed to contributing to economic growth and transformation,” she said.

She also said that the bank showed up when its customers needed it most by ensuring that “customers can benefit from more affordable lending rates.”

“We also offered credit relief programmes to our customers in response to Covid–19 challenges with over UGX 800 billion worth of loans were restructured in 2020,” he added.

Stanbic also increased support to the community and invested over UGX 3.9 billion through Corporate Social Investment programmes.

“We made donations to frontline health workers in collaboration with the Ministry of Health, contributed food and supplies to local communities where we operate and continued to provide support in the areas of education, environment and maternal health,” she said.

Stanbic restructures; eyes new revenue sources

In addition to the performance updates, Mr. Mashanda provided a progress update on the holding company’s key initiatives and achievements in 2020.

“In 2018, given the emergence of non-traditional competitors in financial services, a strategic decision was taken to diversify revenue streams from the banking business, essentially creating new pools of revenue for the franchise and this led to the creation of Stanbic Uganda Holdings Limited. The holding company is strategically positioned to build and leverage on the strength of the banking brand and transport this to other opportunities in other ecosystems that are beyond banking. This is the first phase of our strategy of transforming the franchise here in Uganda into the leading digital platform services organization, which is now well on course,” he said. 

“It was an incredibly difficult year for the entire economy, but Stanbic has shown that it remains a strong and well-capitalised bank committed to contributing to economic growth and transformation” ~ ANNE JUUKO

“The anchor subsidiary is Stanbic Bank Uganda Limited. We have now established Stanbic Properties Uganda Limited, a real estate business, Stanbic Business Incubator Limited, FlyHub Uganda Limited, a technology business that is the bedrock of our digital platform services organisation, and SBG Securities Limited, which is a stockbroking and asset management business. The latter is still going through the process of licensing and is expected to commence business soon,” he said.

Looking ahead, Mashanda said SUHL is appropriately positioned to enhance its value offerings, meet the needs of clients and increase value for stakeholders.   

On the bank's future outlook, Juuko said that as Uganda’s Oil and Gas sector is set to achieve the Final Investment Decision soon, Stanbic was positioning itself to play an instrumental role in the development of the sector.

“The emergence of oil and gas will create vast opportunities for the local economy and our role as a Bank is to provide financial solutions to clients across the entire value chain especially for local companies looking to participate in the sector,” she said, adding: “Stanbic remains committed to its purpose —“Uganda is our home and we drive her growth” by contributing to economic growth and transformation. We shall continue to deliver the right solutions for our clients, as we conduct our business in a responsible and sustainable manner to deliver shared prosperity for all our stakeholders.”