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From 12 employees to 2200 – Bank celebrates 110 years of operations

From 12 employees to 2200 – Bank celebrates 110 years of operations

FNB Namibia celebrated 110 years of operations this week and highlighted the milestones over the years that made them into an innovative bank in the country.

The bank started operations in Lüderitz in 1907 with only 12 employees and over the 110 years has grown into a leading bank in the country and through active upskilling and localization programmes.

To date the bank employs more than 2 200 locals and provides banking services via 55 branches and agencies throughout the country, while providing multifaceted financial services and products.

Sarel van Zyl, CEO of FNB Namibia Holdings Group said, “It is with great pride that we celebrate 110 years in our beautiful country and look back at a numerous highlights over the years, which have made us the most innovative bank in the country.”

In 1997 FNB Namibia became the first locally registered bank to be listed on the Namibian Stock Exchange. Market capitalization has soared from N$167.2 million to N$8.8 billion in 18 years, making us the biggest listed entity on the Namibia Stock Exchange. “We are proud to say that we have delivered consistent earnings growth and created value for all our stakeholders,” he added.

According to him other recent highlights include FNB Namibia being the first bank in Namibia to successfully roll-out 46 Automated Deposit Taking ATMS to date, with an average processing volume of 56 000 deposits over the past three months, after hours and over weekends.

In Namibia, we have around 4274 active point of sale terminals, and of those 1290 are ready to launch our CASH-Back on POS later in 2017 to take banking to remote areas around the country,” said the CEO.

On the electronic banking front, FNB Namibia has been the pioneer with services and products that have made banking easy and convenient for our customers. These innovations include cellphone banking, online banking, the FNB App and eWallet, to name but a few.

Since the inception of eWallet, FNB Namibia has a base of 1 171,507 Wallets and the number of transacting wallets for May 2017 stood at 378,552.

We have recently acquired EBank, giving our customers the capability to remotely open accounts via cellphones, transfer cash in and out using only cellphones, while transacting through 120 agents’ country-wide,” he added.

FNB Holdings, has also recently acquired Pointbreak to form Ashburton Investments, and together with RMB (our Corporate and Investment Bank), WesBank (our Installment Finance business), and FNB (our Retail and Commercial bank), now offers the most comprehensive and end-to-end financial services Group in Namibia.

The FNB Namibia Holdings Foundation Trust remains committed to help improve the quality of communities and environments in which it operates by investing through partnership. It regards Social Corporate Responsibility as an integral part of its corporate business practice.

Over the last 13 years, we have invested 64 million in the areas of skills development, education and financial literacy, community and health development, environmental guardianship, and primary health care”, added Sarel.

 


Caption: FNB employees who have been with the bank for more than 25 years: From left to right: Sickie van Aswegen, Riana Maasdorp, Hester Coertzen, Angelique de Bruyn, John Bastiaans, Mariechen Wohler, Ester Swart, Petronella Losch, Elmarie Cilliers.


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