Director's Report

The year 2009 was a challenging year worldwide. The USA has known the deepest and longest economic downturn since the great depression that started in 1929. The gross domestic products of the USA contracted from mid-2009 till the third quarter of 2009 following the global economic downturn, sub-prime mortgage crisis and investment bank failures. This situation affected the world economy and resulted in decrease in interest rates globally.

Fortunately, the above described situation did not affect the local economy adversely and demonstrated the strength of the local banking system. Another major development in 2009 was the initiation of the government debt restructuring program.  In this respect, the Dutch government started repaying outstanding local government debts and the local government stopped issuing securities in April 2009. This situation put a downward pressure on local interest rates and forced local commercial banks to become more efficient and competitive to achieve expected results.

Anticipating the abovementioned situation, Girobank N.V. (‘Girobank’) chose to focus her strategy on fortifying her solvency position rather than growing in 2009. The bank succeeded in this strategy; Girobank managed to increase her operating income by ANG 7.3 million (13%) despite the economic challenges and generated the highest profit in her history. The bank generated a record net result before taxes  and before other comprehensive income of ANG 15.2 million, which resulted in an increase of 7% in the net result after taxes and before other comprehensive income. The total assets of Girobank grew by ANG 38.0 million (3%) in this period.

In our effort to continuously improve the service to our customers, Girobank opened two new branches in Curaçao: La Confianza branch and Renaissance branch. La Confiansa branch, which is strategically located in the heart of downtown Punda, immediately became one of Girobank’s most visited branches. Furthermore, in order to meet the high demand of the local community in Bonaire, Girobank also managed to open her first branch on this island.

In addition to expanding our physical presence, Girobank is the first bank in the Netherlands Antilles to introduce mobile banking using state of the art technology. The first phase of the mobile banking service, which allows our clients to do balance inquiry and receive transaction alerts through their mobile phone, was launched in the last quarter of 2009. It is the intention to continuously add more features to the mobile banking service, such as bill payments, in order to enable our clients to perform most banking transactions from their mobile phones.

As a good corporate citizen, our community has our commitment to continue investing, just as we did in 2009, in several non-profit initiatives such as sports activities for our youth. Girobank will continue investing in healthcare, since this is an area that requires the attention of any responsible citizen.

We will not forget how important nature is and will invest in order to help preserve the unique flora and fauna in our islands. Fundashon “Bo Motivashon, nos Invershon” will continue granting scholarships to our students, in order to help create leaders for the future, since we can only achieve this through education.

We see 2010 as an exciting year, a year in which we have to remain competitive in order to face the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities in front of us. The US economy has started to show some signs of recovery. The local market is expected to become more liquid in the foreseeable future, as the Dutch Government repays maturing local government debts. Local commercial banks may face challenges trying to reinvest the funds resulting from the repayment of the government bonds currently in their portfolio, in assets with similar risk-return ratio. This is expected to result in increasing competition in the local financial sector; Girobank is prepared to face this challenge.

In conclusion: we are confident that the key to our success is offering the best quality of service to our clients. Therefore, we will put all our efforts together to continuously improve our services and offer products that satisfy the needs of our clients.

Last, but certainly not least, we would like to extend our heartfelt gratitude to our shareholders and Supervisory Directors for their support; to our employees for their outstanding effort and commitment to the bank; and especially to our reason for existence - our clients- whose confidence and support are of immense value and essential for the growth and profitability of our bank.

On behalf of  the Board of Managing Directors,
Eric Garcia
Manuel Suena
Curaçao, May 2009

Read our Financial highlights 2009 please click here
Read our Financial highlights 2008 please click here
Read our Financial highlights 2007 please click here
Read more about our Financial highlights 2006 please click here
Read our Financial highlights 2005 please click here