Since JMMB Group Trinidad and Tobago became the 100 per cent shareholder of Intercommercial Bank T&T (IBL) ten years ago, there has been a significant uptick in its overall performance. The JMMB Group acquired a 50 per cent shareholding in IBL from the Mittal family in December 2004 and in 2005 the company announced plans to acquire IBL and Intercommercial Trust and Merchant Bank after getting approval from T&T’s Central Bank.
JMMB Bank T&T CEO, Shawn Moses, told Business Guardian on Tuesday that when looking at the performance of Intercommercial before and after its full ownership by JMMB in 2013, there have been ups and downs based on what was happening in the economy. But for the past few years there have been very positive financial performances.
Moses said in 2013, JMMB Bank T&T’s contribution to net profit was less than five per cent of the profitability of the JMMB Group, which is headquartered in Jamaica and listed on the stock exchanges of both T&T and Jamaica. In 2018, the bank’s contribution to the group’s net profit stood at eight per cent and in 2023 it jumped to 17 per cent.
He noted that as of March 31, 2023, the end of its financial year, the total assets of JMMB Bank T&T, stood at $3.14 billion which represents a four per cent increase compared to the previous year.
The executive said the loan portfolio for the bank as of March 31 stood at $1.4 billion and that represented a 16 per cent increase year over year.
“That’s a significant increase from a year-over-year perspective and that is a considerable uptick and shows that we are, as an entity, heading in the right direction in T&T and overall, from a good perspective, when we look at Jamaica, Dominican Republic and Barbados,” Moses remarked.
Moses, who has been in the bank’s CEO for over 18 months, said he is pleased to be part of the financial institution as it is on an upward trajectory and celebrates its 10th anniversary on September 25.
“JMMB is here to stay and will continue to improve its financial performance year on year, as is evident in our annual audited financials.”
Asked whether by assets JMMB bank is considered this country’s smallest bank, Moses said when one looks at the Central Bank data, he would say its total assets represent about two per cent of the overall assets of the T&T banks as four major players make up roughly 97 per cent total assets within the economy.
“So, there is a sizable disparity or distance between those four larger financial institutions. I do not believe that I am the smallest when we look at the other entities in the banking sector,” said Moses.
As it relates to services being offered, Moses said everything that a traditional bank offers, such as day-to-day banking services, savings, and investment options, is offered by JMMB Bank.
He mentioned that the bank covers a wide cross-section of loan types, and the focus right now is on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), with JMMB refining its offerings to make it a bit easier and more convenient for them.
Moses boasted about the bank’s robust digital platform, outlining that it recently launched a queue-management system, which allows clients to be better served and give immediate feedback on service that they would have received.
The bank CEO said its digital transformation has been at a pace and, with the onset of the pandemic, the team ramped up its activities, initiatives, and projects to support the build-out of a digital footprint across business line segments.
“In the coming year, the focus to this end will be on the implementation of new core banking and online banking platforms.
The bank currently operates from four locations–at Ariapita Avenue, Tunapuna, Chaguanas, and San Fernando. Moses said more locations would be operational in the coming months, but kept close to his chest, where those would be located.
He indicated that the bank roughly has 50,000 customers at present, which is growing.
The executive said the most important thing the bank is doing to celebrate this milestone is called Sponsor a Student, which is a CSR initiative where the bank has two selected two students who performed well but need financial support.
“We bought them laptops, gave them vouchers to buy books and uniforms. The bank also opened an E-plus savings account and gave them an initial $500.00 deposit.
“This will be an annual initiative once they continue to be in need and continue to maintain good grades every year, We will continue to support them in this manner, and this will be an annual initiative of JMMB. Next year we will open it up to more applicants and we do expect it to increase the number of people enrolled in the programme to at least four next year,” Moses disclosed.