BRE announces zl.335 mn profit and five-year strategy

BRE Bank, one of Poland's leading investment banking players, has announced a net profit of zl.335 million for the year 2000, giving it a 13% return-on-equity (ROE), which the bank plans to improve to 19% by the year 2006. At the same time, BRE intends to focus on developing four major areas of activity: corporate, investment, retail banking, and asset management. Over the next three years the bank intends to spend $50 million on developing its retail banking activities, comprising the Internet-based mBank and the Multibank network of some 50 branches, rather than 100 as planned earlier. Both these ventures would operate as BRE subsidiaries and in time would be floated on the Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE), BRE representatives said. In order to allow customers easier access to mBank, which opened its virtual doors in November 2000, its mother company plans to launch a network of Internet cafes. BRE president Wojciech Kostrzewa also said that asset management would remain an important part of his institution's activity, stressing that BRE-owned TFI Skarbiec investment fund is the largest in Poland. Each year, BRE intends to pay out one-third of its net profit in dividends, use the remainder to boost its capital and, furthermore, is not planning to issue new shares in the next five years. German Commerzbank is the strategic investor in BRE, with a stake exceeding 48%. (Puls Biznesu, p.4, Gazeta Wyborcza, p.21) T.J.