Jamaica Money Market Brokers (JMMB) recorded a 10.5 per cent reduction in net profit to $986.4 million but its cash and equivalents increased 50 per cent for the 12 months ending March 2010.

The group stated that its reduction in net profit was due to one-off foreign exchange (FX) gains in the prior year. Excluding the FX gains, the group would have posted better returns as it benefited from serious improvements in its operational efficiencies. Its net interest income increased year-on-year by 40.6 per cent to $1.9 billion whilst administrative expenses decreased by 14.1 per cent year-on-year.

The increased efficiencies resulted in the group’s cash and equivalents jumping from $2.4 to $3.6 billion.

Contextually, the group made $961 million in FX gains in 2009 which it called a return to “normalisation” compared with the “extraordinary foreign exchange gains of $3.36 billion” in 2008 when the Jamaican dollar lost a quarter of its value against its US counterpart.

The group interestingly stated that reduced interest rates positively impacted its business due to “the strategic re-alignment of the group’s portfolio through active asset liability management and growth in the balance sheet, coupled with the continued reduction in interest rates by the Central Bank”.

Following the Jamaica Debt Exchange earlier this year, JMMB said it cut rates by two percentage points to as low as 16.95 per cent across the entire portfolio of loan offerings. Total assets grew by J$11.8 billion or 10.6 per cent over end of year.

“JMMB continues to stand for Jamaica and the countries in which we operate. In Jamaica, we will continue to support accountability in the management of the economy through the monitoring of IMF targets and growth plans for our country. As we are all interlinked in our society, JMMB maintains its strong commitment to Corporate Social Responsibility by working in targeted communities across our island,” said group chief executive officer, Keith Duncan.

The group said it continued to exceed its regulatory capital requirements. The company’s capital to risk weighted assets ratio stood at 44.6 per cent whereas the Financial Services Commission (FSC) benchmark stipulates a minimum of 14 per cent, it stated. The company’s capital to total assets ratio was 8.4 per cent whereas the FSC benchmark is six per cent, it stated.

The Operations in the Dominican Republic grew with a client portfolio at US$53 million as at March 31, 2010. The group’s acquisition of 80 per cent of the Corporacion de Credito America SA (CCA), further rounded out the business model by providing savings accounts and loans to the retail market in Dominican Republic. The group also opened a branch of its affiliated Intercommercial Banking Group in Port of Spain, Trinidad. The group added that consequent to the successful sale of its minority equity holding in the associated companies of CMMB, the share of profits from associate companies, while impacted, continued to contribute favourably to the JMMB Group. The group’s client base stands at over 155,000.