ABU DHABI: First Gulf Bank (FGB) will expand into three or four new foreign markets in 2014, seeking to push the percentage of its profit contributed by international operations into double digits, its chief executive said yesterday.
The second-largest lender in the UAE by market value, majority-owned by Abu Dhabi’s royal family, expects to obtain banking licences in China and South Korea. It is also considering expanding into Indonesia and London.
The bank’s overseas business, in Qatar, Singapore, Hong Kong, India and Libya, currently contributes about 7 percent of profits.
“We love Asia, there is trade flow and business, a large number of flights between Asia and the UAE,” Andre Sayegh said in an interview.
“We expect our profit from international (business) to grow to the early teens” in the short-term, he said.
FGB posted third-quarter net profit of Dh1.19bn ($324m), up 13 percent from a year earlier and in line with analyst forecasts.
Double-digit profit growth is sustainable on a quarterly basis and will be driven by the bank’s strong balance sheet, Sayegh said. “The bank has 180 billion dirhams in assets — you can command a certain level of profitability by managing the balance sheet line by line.” Reuters
