Test Drive 2q:2014 | Page 45

Contd.... these banks would have passed the stress test with ease and thus place them on par with international banks. Based on the results, it would appear 2013 was a positive performing year for these 7 banks and a good turn around for their future challenges. We are almost into the third quarter of 2014 let’s see what the full financial year will bring. Hopefully we should be reporting more profits, less expenditures and increased earnings for all financial institutions operating within the banking sector. Bank Award, Mr Kunle Sonola; Managing Director GTBank Kenya, receiving African Bankers Award for GTB Analysis & Comments Chart 5 : Z -Test Scores For Banks in Sierra Leone Based on 2013 Financial Statements Analyis & Comments Skye bank scored just below the critical 1.24 benchmark with UTB and Standard chartered almost neck on neck for second position. Since the global financial crisis that occurred over the past few years, new measures by Central Banks and policy makers are ensuring that banks are adequately capitalized, this measure ensures that potential defaults can be identifies quite early and the risk of collapse averted. The Z-score formula is used to predict whether a firm will go into banktrupcy within two years based on a number of variables. In simulations and tests the Altman Z-Score was found to be 72% accurate in predicting bankruptcy two years before the event. Chart 6: Return on Capital Employed for Retail Banks in Sierra Leone 2013 Analysis & Comments Shareholders and Management at GTB, UBA and ECO must be quite pleased with such performing results in terms of Returns on capital employed (ROCE). Managers’ own performance is often evaluated by shareholders in terms of the company’s overall return on capital employed. these points are relatively insignificant when compared to two further difficulties. The first concerns the fact that accounting profit rather than cash flow is used as the basis of evaluation. This is an entirely incorrect concept to use in a decision-making context. Accounting profit is a reporting concept; it is a creation of accountants. A capital investment decision is an economic or resource allocation decision and the economic unit of account is cash, because it is cash that gives power over resources. The other criticism of ROCE is that it also ignores the time value of money.