NCBA Core Numbers at a glance;

Why the NCBA story starts with numbers

When serious investors look at a bank, they should not start with slogans. They should start with numbers. Numbers reveal scale. Numbers reveal discipline. Numbers reveal whether leadership is merely talking or actually converting strategy into profit, customer growth, lending power, deposits, dividends and long-term shareholder value. On that test, NCBA Group is not asking the market to believe in a dream. It is presenting a balance sheet, an income statement, a digital machine and a strategy that can be measured.

The strongest case for NCBA begins with the fact that this is now a KES 716 billion asset institution. That figure matters because banking is a trust business before it is a profit business. Customers deposit money where they see stability. Investors follow institutions that can defend capital, absorb shocks and still grow. At KES 716 billion in total assets, KES 532 billion in customer deposits and KES 350 billion in lending, NCBA has the size to influence credit, business expansion, household liquidity and investment flows across the region.

The profit story is equally important. NCBA reported KES 23.4 billion in profit after tax for FY2025, up 7.0 percent from KES 21.9 billion in FY2024. Profit before tax stood at KES 27.9 billion, while operating income rose 17.0 percent to KES 73.3 billion. These are not small numbers. They show a bank that is still producing earnings in a difficult economy where customers are cautious, credit risk is real, and margins across the banking sector are under pressure.

For shareholders, the most direct signal is the dividend. NCBA lifted its FY2025 dividend per share to KES 7.10, from KES 5.50 in FY2024. The total dividend payout rose to KES 11.7 billion. This is what investors should pay attention to. A bank can publish glossy strategy documents, but the real test is whether it can turn strategy into cash returns for shareholders. NCBA is doing that while still investing in technology, regional scale and new growth segments.

The customer base tells an even bigger story. NCBA reports more than 65 million customers, supported by 123 branches and more than 4,064 staff. Kenya alone carries 100 branches, 459,000 core banking customers and 34.7 million digital customers. Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda add more physical-bank presence, while Ivory Coast and Ghana show how NCBA’s digital model can travel beyond traditional branch banking. This is the future of African finance: not a bank waiting for customers to walk into a branch, but a bank already sitting inside the phone, the transaction, the merchant, the salary cycle, the emergency and the investment decision.

The KES 1.399 trillion digital lending engine

The digital lending number is the one that should make every investor pause. NCBA reported KES 1.399 trillion in digital disbursements in FY2025. On a simple annual-average basis, that is about KES 3.83 billion lent per day. Break it further and it is about KES 159.7 million every hour. This does not mean the bank lends the same amount every hour of every day, but it gives a sense of the scale of the engine NCBA has built. Very few institutions in this region touch that level of repeat customer activity at such speed.