JEDDAH — The National Commercial Bank (NCB) and the Arab Centres Group, a subsidiary of the Fawaz Hokair Group with a holding worth SR600 million, have signed a six-year Islamic financing agreement to establish Hofuf Commercial Centre and Azizia Commercial Complex in the Holy City of Makkah, as well as for expansion of the Dhahran Commercial Centre.
Amin Al Afifi, NCB head of corporate banking sector, signed the agreement with Hokair Group chairman Fawaz Hokair in Riyadh recently.
Ahmed Bajunaid, IBG chief corporate banker at the NCB, said the bank's Islamic corporate finance services were constantly evolving to keep up with clients' requirements. "There is a need to invent new products to meet their expectations. These are the main pillars NCB is seeking to achieve, which affirms its leadership in this area over the past several years," he added.
Fawaz Hokair said that the present agreement is part of an ambitious expansion plan in the real estate sector which includes five-star hotels, office towers and shopping complexes.
NCB financing covers industrial and retail sectors apart from construction, building materials and car purchase.
SCP collaboration
Meanwhile, NCB, in collaboration with Scala Certified Partner (SCP) United Yousef Naghi Co. Ltd, has successfully deployed 40 of its branches with Scala InfoChannel Digital Signage Software.
NCB's digital signage network is centrally managed from its corporate headquarters. Twenty plasma screens distributed around the corporate headquarters provide employees relevant corporate messaging and create a corporate community within the corporation. Content is created, under the direction of the bank's management, by SCP United Yousef Naghi Co. Ltd using text, graphics, still images, and animations. The 42-inch screen distributed throughout the bank's branches display content about bank services, special bank promotions, relevant news headlines and more.
The implementation of the digital signage system provides a platform for NCB to better communicate with its employees, educating them about the bank's products and services and enhancing the service they provide to their customers. The digital signage system provides branded messages aimed at providing uplift in sales by informing customers about the varied products and services the bank has to offer.
Rami Badran, general manager of the PRO-AV & Multimedia Projects Division of United Yousef Naghi Co. Ltd, said that the bank plans to extend the network to all 300 NCB branches within three years time.
It may be noted that recently NCB announced a SR1.70 billion net income in the first quarter of 2007, a decline of 8.1 per cent compared to SR1.85 billion in the first quarter of 2006.
Abdullah Bahamdan, NCB chairman, explained that the decline was due to the capital gains that the bank realised during the first quarter of 2006 which totalled SR268 million. He added that the net income, excluding capital gains actually increased by 6.4 per cent from SR1.58 billion for the first quarter of 2006 to SR1.68 billion for the first quarter of 2007.
Total assets grew by 16.6 per cent to SR167.76 billion in the period under review. Net loans and advances increased to SR78.73 billion, an increase of 6.6 per cent and customer deposits reached to SR122.05 billion, an increase of 21.4 per cent.
In addition, NCB's total shareholders' equity grew by 16.6 per cent to SR25.24 billion and the ratio of equity to assets stood at a robust 15 per cent, thus reinforcing the bank's strong capital adequacy ratio.