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BOŚ SABOS bank plans rapid growth in loan assets, wants to cut financing costs
Listed lender BOS assumes that by the end of 2027, its total balance sheet will grow to more than PLN 30 billion (EUR 7.04 bln); plans rapid growth of credit assets, including pro-environmental assets, the bank representatives told a conference. They added that BOS is counting on a lower cost of financing and wants to finance the planned faster growth from its own profits.
"We want to make a turn towards smaller entities, local Polish entities, which allows us to build a diversified loan portfolio," said the bank's CEO Bartosz Kublik.
The lender is currently in a collective remedial programme. The bank's total capital ratio at the end of June was 17.54 percent and its Tier 1 capital ratio was 16.65 percent.
"We want to provide results that will be implemented systematically and will give the basis for the bank to exit the remedial programme process; our actions are aimed at exiting the programme," Kublik said.
"In our strategic assumptions for the next three years, we mainly assume profit accumulation as the basic element of capital building," he added.
The CEO announced that the bank plans to issue bonds under the MREL requirement.
At Wednesday's conference, the representatives of the lender said that BOS' indices and results to date were below expectations.
Bank's total assets grew by 7 percent between December 2014 and June 2024, compared to a 104 percent increase in Poland's banking sector. The bank's NPL ratio increased to 14.5 percent, while the banking sector average fell to 5.3 percent.
The bank said that between 2014 and 2023, the number of individual customers fell by 38 percent and the number of institutional customers (including micro) fell by 47 percent (between 2018 and 2023).
"BOS is not a first-choice bank for many customers. By not being a first-choice bank, we have a higher cost of funding than our competitors," CEO Kublik said.
"During the past 10 years, when the banking sector grew by 100 percent, BOS increased its assets by 7 percent. The number of customers fell, but NPLs increased. We need to reverse this trend," he added.
The CEO reported that bank's higher lending rates were causing an influx of higher-risk customers into the bank.
BOS reported that it wants to remain the bank of first choice for customers who are making or want to make environmentally friendly investments.
The bank is to be digitalised, plans partnerships with local government units in each region, partnerships with the cooperative bank sector and plans to finance green infrastructure for local governments in cooperation with the cooperative bank sector, farming agency ARiMR and national agriculture support centre KOWR.
According to the plans, by the end of 2027, BOS' balance sheet total is expected to exceed PLN 30 billion (EUR 7.04 bln), while it currently stands at around PLN 21 billion (EUR 4.9 bln).
"We need to grow at an annual rate of around 14 percent. We will develop a stable, solid result of banking activity, in which we cover the costs of the bank's operation, the costs of risk, and iron out the balance sheet surplus into net result," the CEO said.
According to the plan, the ROE ratio is to be greater than 10 percent and the level of WNDB greater than PLN 1.2 billion (EUR 281.6 mln).
The non-performing loan ratio is to fall to 8 percent. At the end of June, the ratio was 13 percent.
The share of green loans in total loan balances at the end of June was 39 percent, and this is expected to be above 50 percent by the end of 2027.
In the corporate area, the bank wants to double the number of customers to 4,360 by the end of 2027, and loan assets here are to increase by 35 percent to PLN 12 billion (EUR 2.8 bln). Factoring turnover is to be doubled to a target of PLN 7.8 billion (EUR 1.8 bln).
In the retail area, micro and agro customers, the bank wants to acquire 150,000 new customers and have 300,000 of them as a target, and the loan portfolio in this segment is to grow to PLN 7 billion (EUR 1.6 bln).
Among other things, the bank plans to introduce an automatic credit decision for micro and retail in 2025, wants to have a digital deposit acquisition channel and wants to open a currency exchange office for the retail customer.
In 2026, there will be new remote solutions for customers, among others, new systems for the credit process, a new system for the credit process, SMEs and Corpo. In 2027, the implementation of a new factoring system is planned, among other things.
BOS' largest shareholder is Poland's National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management NFOSiGW, which holds 58.05 percent of the bank's shares.
seb/ nl/ ao/
