East West Banking Corp. reported an unaudited net income after taxes of P180 million in 2005, P34 million more than its profit the year before, capping a successful year of focusing more on consumer financing.
EWB President and CEO Elrey T. Ramos attributed the bank’s remarkable performance to increased investments in personnel and infrastructure in line with the bank’s expansion program.
The bank heightened its thrust to serve the consumer market in 2005 resulting in a 17 percent increase in consumer loans by yearend. EWB’s loan portfolio mix was 70 percent corporate and 30 percent consumer at the beginning of the year.
The bank’s total resources totalled to P24.9 billion, marking a P2.38 billion or 11 percent increase from the previous year. The increase was driven by a P2.95 billion or 15 percent growth to P21.2 billion in deposit liabilities.
EWB opened four new Personal Banking Centers (PBCs) in 2005. The bank’s branch network stood at 70 as of end-December.
The expansion in resource was also supported by a P1.6 billion or 30.2 percent increase in investments, mostly in government bonds and securities.
Meanwhile, loans jumped by P1.1 billion or 10 percent to P12.2 billion from P11.1 billion.
The bank’s aggressive marketing of its consumer products led to significant increases in its various consumer loans.
Auto loans rose by 189 percent to P3.3 billion from P900 million level a year earlier while the number of accounts expanded by 254 percent.
Credit card receivables grew by 222 percent to P350 million as of end-December fueled by a 110 percent expansion in cardholders’ base to 22,000.
Salary loans also jumped by 124 percent with the 154 percent growth in accounts to 4,000.
In 2005, EWB, ranked 17th by asset size amongst 34 commercial and universal banks spent over P50 million for IT investment in new application soft wares, network and data servers, and set up of a data processing backup and disaster recovery centers.
"Looking at year 2005, I think we were quite successful. In 2004, we prepared for consumer banking thrust. In 2005 we felt the initial impact of the investment made. We hope to feel the full impact and the benefits of the consumer banking thrust in the coming years,"Ramos said.
Ramos said EWB will continue its goal to serve the consumer market and plans are afoot to convert the bank’s other branches into consumer banking delivery channels.
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