PACRA Maintains Entity Ratings of Allied Bank Limited

Lahore, July 01, 2020 (PPI-OT): Allied Bank Limited is one of the top five banks of the country in terms of its deposit share. The bank’s franchise, spread over a network of 1,395 branches, has enabled sustainable footprints into the country’s deposit base. The bank’s risk absorption capacity, as reflected in its sound equity base, has grown over the years. Another reflection of this is ABL’s significantly robust CAR (22% as at Dec19), beyond the industry average. While ABL has realistic approach towards lending, increased attention is being diverted towards deepening of current business relationships and an enduring emphasis is laid on building trade business.

The bank’s technology platform is a strength. This has facilitated fast and effective decision making while extending quality counter banking and e-banking services to its customers, additionally this also has enabled itself to operate with high efficiency and capacity even in current pandemic situation. The related benefits would continue to unfold over the years. The ratings recognize the management’s concerted efforts in sustaining the sound asset quality, which covered the high advances concentration comparatively to financially sound groups; ensuring that aggregate risks are within Bank’s overall risk appetite.

The low infection ratio and good coverage ratio are considered positive. The continued strengthening in retail deposit market would enable further improvement in deposit granularity in terms of concentration as well as funding cost as CA has reported significant growth during the year. The market share needs to be harnessed. At the same time, achieving efficiency in terms of utilization of its healthy CAR may help in further boosting ABL’s market share and profitability. As due to ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, profits are expected to take slight dip however, overall costs would not experience much growth.

Covid-19 has posed challenges to the banking sector, as almost all segments of the economy, worldwide and domestically, are getting negatively impacted. The ramifications would continue to unfold, warranting vigilance and timely actions where needed. The management’s ongoing concerted efforts towards enhancing diversification in its revenue stream, enrichment of customer profile, further penetration in retail deposits and continuous optimization in cost structure remain important.

For more information, contact:
Analyst
The Pakistan Credit Rating Agency Limited (PACRA)
Awami Complex, FB1, Usman Block New Garden Town,
Lahore – Pakistan
Tel: +9242 586 9504 -6
Fax: +9242 583 0425
Email: hammad.rashid@pacra.com
Web: www.pacra.com