ASA International Group PLC

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to ASA International's 2024 results. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session through the phone lines, and instructions will follow at that time. I would like to remind all participants that this call is being recorded. I will now hand over to Jonathan Berger, Head of IR, to open the presentation. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good afternoon. And thank you for joining ASHA International's 2024 results webcast. As you will no doubt have already seen, we released our 2024 results first thing this morning, alongside our Q1 2025 business update. I'm joined here on the call by ASHA International CEO, Rob Keijers and CFO, Tamwe Rahman. Rob and Tamwe will run through this results presentation and afterwards we'll be happy to take any questions you may have. Before we begin, let me draw your attention to the disclaimer at the end of the presentation. Please be advised that if you continue to listen to this presentation, you are bound by this disclaimer. With the formalities out of the way, I would now like to hand over to Rob for his opening remarks.

Yeah, thank you, Jonathan. And I'd also like to add my own warm welcome to today's webcast. Of course, I'm honored to be hosting my first results since being appointed as CEO. But let's start with the important part, and that's the 2024 performance. And last year truly saw a return to sustainable growth for us international. It is pleasing to note that we've seen sustained improvement in both business and financial KPIs in 2024, when compared to last year. And also the start of 2025 was very promising. It has always been clear to me that leadership is at the heart of driving success throughout the company. And since 2024, I've sought to implement a new leadership and management approach, which I believe has empowered our people and created a renewed alignment. This was also combined with strengthening our executive committee at the group, as well as senior layers of local management in the countries. And what we've seen from this focus on leadership is that it has led to further operational excellence. Clients have grown by 8% compared to 2023, as our client base has surpassed the 2.5 million mark per the end of December. By the end of March, we've reached 2.6 million. The loan portfolio, or OLP, increased to 446.6 million, which includes both the on-book and the off-book portfolio, and represents a 21% growth year on year. From an efficiency and productivity perspective, we can see that on average, individual loan officers are serving more clients than last year. And the strong operational performance has also translated into significantly improved financial performance with net profit more than traveling. Total comprehensive income grew to 22.1 million in 2024, compared to a loss of 16 million in 23, as the negative FXG valuation impact was much reduced. It is this financial performance which provided the confidence to resume the payment of dividends last December in line with our dividend policy. And today we announced a final dividend of 4.1 cents per share, which along with the interim dividends equates to a 25% payout ratio. Later, Tonwe will dive into the financials in great detail in this presentation. But let me take you through the ORP from a regional perspective, the Outstanding Loan Portfolio. Here you can see that our well-diversified portfolio is driving OOP growth with the portfolio effects, helping to drive the improved operational performance we are reporting today. And then on a regional basis, all four of our regional reporting segments have demonstrated loan growth in 24 versus 23. Moreover, the positive trends also continued into Q1 of this year. East Africa continues to be the growth engine for the group, both in terms of total portfolio size and the year-on-year growth. but other regions have performed well as a whole as well. In South Asia, the strong performance lever, both in Pakistan and Sri Lanka, was offset by the deliberate reduction of our loan book in India, in line with our decision to deconsolidate the business in that country. In West Africa, Ghana continues to be the standard contributor, while it's pleasing to also see that Nigeria starts to grow its loan portfolio once again after difficult periods. And lastly, the Philippines and Myanmar Both performed well and contributed to the region's positive contribution in 2024. Then, of course, after the outstanding loan portfolio, also the loan portfolio quality. One of the big benefits of the ASA model is that it consistently delivers high portfolio quality, as evidenced by the low group par of 2.2%, the par 30, that is. This level was achieved both at the end of 2024 and also at the first quarter of this year. Outstanding portfolio quality was consistently recorded in Ghana, Kenya, Uganda, and Myanmar with a par 30 less than half a percent. Other items to note here include India portfolio quality, which reflect the market dynamics and fed into the decision to withdraw from this market. Also the Philippines worsening par was due to the multiple typhoons, which hit the country badly in 2024. And of course, we're all aware that a devastating earthquake hit Myanmar at the end of March. Thankfully, the direct impact of the earthquake on AASA Myanmar was limited from both a client and employee perspective, as well as from an office and branch infrastructure standpoint. AASA Myanmar is currently not facing any loan collection or portfolio quality issues, as there are no AASA branches in the affected areas. But this situation will continue to be closely monitored. And of course, we stand by our colleagues and clients in Myanmar. On that note, I'll hand over to Tanvir to review our financial performance in greater detail. Tanvir, over to you.