Mr. Frankie Hayford made this disclosure while delivering a speech at the Gala Dinner and Award Night recently organised by Trust Bank to celebrate 25 years of existence.
The TBL Board Chair dwelled briefly on the history of Trust Bank and also highlighted some of the significant developments that have occurred in the company over the past 25 years.
He recalled that Trust Bank Ltd. was incorporated on July 3, 1997, to take over the business of Meridien Biao Bank Gambia, banking operations began on October 1, the same year. He added that the bank was listed on the Ghana Stock Exchange in November 2002, the first cross-border listing in the sub-region.
He said the ownership structure of the bank is quite diverse. According to him, the major shareholders of the bank are Security and Housing Finance Corporation, Databank of Ghana, and other prominent Gambian institutions. He further said that they also have a lot of individual shareholders.
“Historical milestones and a variety of achievements characterise our journey. From humble beginnings marred by reputational issues, we have gained a lot of investors and stakeholders’ confidence through our commitment to implement best practices in the way we do business. We have also launched many products along the way with a steady flow of innovation and continuous expansion through organic growth,” he added.
Hayford also gave a brief overview of some of the key operational and financial accomplishments of Trust Bank.
“In the area of technology, we have implemented cutting edge IT systems to cater for the growth of our operations. As our customer base expanded and our transactions grew, the legacy system we were using was stretched to its limit. We needed something that would provide flexibility and also enable us to improve operational efficiency and we found Oracle flexcube to be our best option. In 2005, we rolled out flexcube 6.0 and later upgraded it to flexcube 12.2 in 2014. This application offers us customer-centric core Banking functionalities and ensures a holistic view of all customers.
“We have also taken advantage of an enhanced information technology platform to introduce a range of e-banking products and services. These include Internet Banking, Mobile Banking and Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) deployed across the country helping us to decongest our branches. Customers can now access salary advances through an automated system using our Mobile Banking Application.
“In terms of financial performance, we have achieved monumental strides in growing our business by gaining significant market share and delivering mind-blowing levels of growth.
“Our assets base increased by 6548% from D174.5 million in 1997 to D11.6 billion by the end of August 2022, driven by growth in loans and advances and investments in the treasury bills. In the same period, loans and advances to customers grew by 4131% from D104Million to over D4.4Billion with solid contribution from retail banking whilst corporate banking led the way with significant investments in almost all sectors of the economy.
Total deposits grew by 5676% from D161 million in 1997 to over D9.3 billion by the end of August 2022, reflecting successful deposit mobilisation despite tight deposit market conditions.
“Trust Bank continues to make substantial corporate tax payments annually. In 2021 as in the previous years, we were one of the top taxpayers in the banking sector. We have paid over a D1 billion in corporate taxes over the last 25 years.”
