Askari Bank Posts Its Highest Ever Yearly Profit, Dividend for 2025
Wire desk byline Sourced from Xinhua, Dawn, Arab News, Anadolu and Minute Mirror. Translated and abridged by the GSRRA Desk.
Askari Bank Limited (PSX: AKBL) reported its highest-ever annual earnings of Rs. 22.9 billion (EPS: Rs. 15.77) in CY25, reflecting an 8 percent year-on-year (Y0Y) increase.
Quarterly, earnings stood at Rs. 4.7 billion (EPS: Rs. 3.29), marking a decline of 32 percent YoY and 36 percent quarter-on-quarter (QoQ).
Alongside the results, the bank announced a final cash dividend of Rs. 1.8 per share for 4QCY25, taking the cumulative annual dividend per share to a record Rs. 5.0 in CY25.
Earnings improved primarily due to higher net interest income and higher non-funded income, according to Arif Habib Limited.
Growth in net interest income was mainly driven by a sharp decline in interest expense, which fell to Rs. 213.3 billion (37 percent YoY). This decline more than offset the 25 percent YoY drop in interest income, resulting in net interest income rising to Rs. 87.7 billion, up 38 percent YoY.
Key drivers of non-funded income included substantial gains on securities (51 percent YoY), higher fee income (12 percent YoY), and an increase in dividend income (12 percent YoY).
The bank recorded a provisioning expense of Rs. 1.8 billion in CY25, compared with a net provisioning reversal of Rs. 1.8 billion in CY24. Meanwhile, operating expenses rose sharply by 39 percent YoY to Rs. 50.9 billion, pushing the cost-to-income ratio to 48 percent, compared with 46 percent in CY24.
The effective tax rate increased to 57 percent in CY25 from 53 percent in CY24.
On the balance sheet, deposits grew to Rs. 1.6 trillion (20 percent YoY), investments increased to Rs. 2.0 trillion (34 percent YoY), while advances declined to Rs. 586 billion (16 percent YoY).
The advance-to-deposit ratio (ADR) and investment-to-deposit ratio (IDR) stood at 35.9 percent and 124.4 percent, respectively.
The stock is currently trading at a price-to-book ratio of 1.1x with a dividend yield of 5.1 percent for CY26E.
Reference Link:- https://propakistani.pk/2026/02/09/askari-bank-posts-its-highest-ever-yearly-profit-dividend-for-2025/
Zamir Ahmed Awan is the founder and Chair of the Global Silk Route Research Alliance, a think tank in Islamabad. He studied engineering at Shanghai University in the 1980s, and years later he went back to China as Pakistan's science counsellor in Beijing, from 2010 until 2016, working on science and higher education cooperation between the two countries.…
