FBN Holdings hit a N3.3 trillion revenue milestone in 2024, up from N1.6 trillion in 2023.

This was influenced by a surge in the interest income it earned from granting loans to customers and from investment securities. It helped drive net profit to N738.9 billion from N310.4 billion.

The unaudited financials of FBN Holdings shared on Thursday, January 30, 2025, saw net interest income, which accounts for the difference between interest income and what banks pay to borrowers as well as what it pays for keeping depositors’ money, accelerate to N1.4 trillion from N546.3 billion in 2024.

Over two years of uninterrupted interest rate hiking by the Central Bank of Nigeria has created a honey pot for lenders to feast on as it allows them to continuously increase the rate at which they lend to borrowers.

The regulator’s expectation that scaling up interest rates will help decelerate inflationary pressures in the economy hasn’t yielded the expected result.

Instead, it has fueled Nigeria’s worst cost-of-living crisis in recent times.

Impairment charge, the cash the bank put aside to cover loans whose quality has been worsened by repeated payment defaults, rose 82.6 per cent to N410.8 billion.

Fees and other commissions climbed to N302.9 billion from N220.3 billion one year prior.

First Bank, FBN Holdings’ commercial banking division, is on the lookout for fresh capital to buck up its capital base to at least half a trillion naira ahead of a March 2026 deadline set by the central bank.

It launched a rights issue last year, seeking to raise N150 billion from shareholders.

Profit before tax for the period under review was up by 142.1 per cent at N862.4 billion.

Total assets grew to N26.5 trillion from N16.9 trillion.