Tanzania CRDB Bank records net profit of Sh353 billion

Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. 

Members of the CRDB Bank’s management team yesterday met with the Denmark Ambassador in Tanzania, Mette Nørgaard Dissing-Spandet, being just days after the lender announced a record net profit of Sh353 billion in the year 2022.

The amount rose from Sh268 billion in 2021. CRDB Bank Plc said in a statement yesterday that during the meeting, Ambassador Dissing-Spandet exuded confidence in CRDB Bank’s growth path.

This follows the recent announcement that Tanzania banks in general are raking in historically massive profits.  Commercial bank net profits in Tanzania rose by about Sh400 billion last year to surpass the Sh1 trillion-mark for the first time in Tanzania banking history.

Speaking to CRDB Bank’s management team, Ambassador Dissing-Spandet said he was happy with CRDB Bank’s 2022 financial results. He said it was an indication that there would be more exciting outcomes in the future, the statement reads.

The relationship between CRDB Bank and the Danish Government dates back to the days when the lender was still known as Cooperative and Rural Development Bank.

During that time, CRDB Bank, which was at that time fully government-owned, experienced operational challenges that compelled the government to seek Denmark’s intervention through its Danish International Development Agency (Danida).

The Danida, through its Danish Investment Fund (DIF) initially took 247,014 shares of CRDB Bank in the year 2002 but its stake has since reached 548,067,648 shares which is equivalent to 21 percent of the lender’s total number of shares.

With the bank’s profitable trend during the past years, the dividend to DIF and the government of Tanzania has also been going up, reaching Sh19.7 billion in 2021, from only Sh247 million in 2002.

According to the CRDB Bank’s managing director, Mr Abdulmajid Nsekela, the rise in the bank’s profit last year was primarily driven by a 13 per cent increase in non-funded income that grew to Sh400 billion from Sh354 billion in the preceding year.

He said the bank has been pushing digital channels for banking throughout the pandemic and post-pandemic, and that has contributed to the growth of the business.

“This cooperation between Danida, government and CRDB Bank Plc has been important in boosting the lender’s business performance each year,” CRDB Bank said in its yesterday’s statement.

It was building on the background of years of cooperation that the Government of Denmark, through its Investment Fund for Developing Countries (IFU), was also partnering with CRDB Bank’s subsidiary in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Denmark is also one of the top development partners who support the delivery of quality health services in Tanzania.