Dubai’s Emirates NBD Forecasts 5% Loan Growth For 2015

Emirates NBD (ENBD), Dubai’s largest lender, expects loan growth to be around five per cent in 2015, it told Reuters on Wednesday.

Loan growth climbed by four per cent in the first quarter of the year, up from the same period of last year, the bank said in its first-quarter earnings statement, released earlier in the day.

In an emailed response to questions, a spokeswoman for ENBD said it forecast 2015 loan growth to be “in the five per cent area.”

The bank expected loan growth to be between five and seven percent in 2015, chief executive Shayne Nelson told reporters in February.

ENBD posted a 60 per cent rise in first-quarter net profit on Wednesday, beating analysts’ forecasts as income from lending, fees and other products increased and provisions dropped.