DBN gives out N631billion loans for MSMEs

The Development Bank of Nigeria (DBN) disbursed N631billion loans to more than 313,058 Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) last year.

Women-owned MSME businesses got 69 per cent share of the loans while 23 per cent Youth-owned MSMEs benefited too.

The bank stated this yesterday in Abuja in its yearly integrated and statutory report for last year.

These figures are higher than the 2021 figures, which saw DBN facilitating access to finance with a total loan disbursement of N482 billion to 208,000 MSMEs in 2021, of which 27 per cent are youth-owned while 66 per cent are owned by women.

For the first time in five years, DBN paid out dividends to its shareholders.

Chairman of the bank, Dr Shehu Yahaya in his address stated that “the directors proposed a dividend of N3,418,435,000, which represents 25 per cent of retained earnings (Profit After Tax and after statutory reserves transfers) in the year ended December 31, 2022.

Based on this, the shareholders approved a dividend payment of N34.18 per share.

According to Dr Yahaya, “having observed the dividends freeze for this past five years period and in view of the need to provide financial returns to the shareholders, the directors are recommending payment of dividend per share of N34.17kobo for each ordinary share in the company.

“This dividend is based on the dividend payout of 25 percent of distributable reserves”.

It was also revealed at the meeting that from $1.26 billion loan given to the DBN from the World Bank, KfW (German Development Bank), Agence Francaise de development and African Development Bank (AfDB), the Federal Government has an outstanding balance of N291.139 billion to pay the foreign partners.

The Federal Government is paying back the $1.26 billion in naira because it guaranteed the loan from the foreign partners. However, the loan was converted into Naira at the prevailing exchange rate then, for ease of transmission to beneficiaries.

As part of the loan repayment schedule, the Federal Government made Principal repayments N23.880 billion; incurred interest expense of N11.128 billion; made on interest repayments of N11.055 billion; has an outstanding balance of N291.139 billion.

Last year, the DBN group assets stood at N517.236 billion while its liabilities maxed out at N305.057 billion.

The report noted that under transaction with subsidiary, “there is an existence of a shared service agreement between DBN and its subsidiary – Impact Credit Guarantee Limited where the bank rendered Human Resources, Information Technology, Administrative, Corporate Communication and Branding, Finance, Internal Audit, Risk Management, Legal and Secretarial Services to its subsidiary either directly or through a third party.

Income realised by the DBN from these shared services the report stated “amounted to N83.76m for the year ended 31 December 2022”.