Zenith Bank loses N200.5m to fraud, forgeries

[su_dropcap]Z[/su_dropcap]enith Bank Plc, in its group annual report and financial statement, recorded a loss of N200,523,436 to fraud and forgeries in 2015.

The Corporate Governance Report of the bank, subtitled under analysis of fraud and forgeries returns, showed that five fraud cases perpetrated by the bank’s staff members resulted in a N155,727,899 loss. This accounted for 78 per cent of losses in the fraud/forgeries category.

The bank was said to have recorded only N14,040,299 as staff perpetrated fraud in 2014, according to details made available at its 25th Annual General Meeting held in Lagos on Wednesday.

For 2015, the bank said it recorded no losses from Automated Teller Machine/electronic fraud and impersonation.

Addressing shareholders at the meeting, the Chairman of the bank, Mr. Jim Ovia, said 2015 was marked by significant global and domestic macroeconomic developments, which impacted the business in many ways.

“But the resilience of our bank has enabled us to successfully weather through these economic headwinds,” he said.

Meanwhile, total deposits for the bank stood at N2.33tn in 2015, representing a three per cent increase over the previous year figure of N2.27tn.

Profit before tax also rose by 6.8 per cent, from N107.85bn in 2014 to N115.22bn in 2015; while profit after tax similarly rose by 6.8 per cent from N92.48bn in 2014 to N98.78bn in 2015.

On dividend payouts, the bank said it had declared and paid an interim dividend of 25 kobo per share in the course of 2015 to shareholders. It also proposed a final dividend of 155 kobo per share. This brought the total dividend for 2015 to 180 kobo per share as against 175 kobo per share that was paid in 2014.

The bank said it had adopted an integrated approach to risk management by bringing all risks together under a limited number of oversight functions.

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