Robust Growth

November 10, 2006 (LBO) – Commercial Bank of Ceylon, one of Sri Lanka’s most profitable commercial banks, Friday posted a 40 percent growth in net profits for the nine months ended Sept. 30, helped partly by capital gains from selling part of shares in DFCC Bank. During the period, the bank also hired Hewitt Outsourcing Services (India) Ltd, to convert its existing pension scheme, from a defined benefit plan to a defined contribution plan.

Group post-tax profits rose 39.46 percent to 2.37 billion rupees during the nine month period, compared with the same period last year.

Commercial Bank’s Senior Deputy General Manager (Finance & Planning) Ranjith Samaranayake said this significant profit growth was partly due to profit from the sale of part of the investments in the shares of DFCC Bank in the second quarter of 2006 and recognition of mark to market gains, which arose as a result of transferring a further portion of shares to the trading portfolio of the Bank during the third quarter of 2006.

Discounting the profit from these transactions, which amounted to 389.4 million rupees, the normal pre-tax profit of the Group for the period under review grew 40.62 percent to 3.66 billion rupees, the bank said in a statement.

Profits were also helped