Dennis Mbingo left FNB Eswatini for Mozambique with one unmistakable addition to the bank: its three-storey headquarters in Ezulwini, the dark-glass exterior now a familiar presence in the valley.
The headquarters was a E200 million investment that brought the bank’s operations under one roof, part of what was described as its longer-term commitment to growth. The numbers at the end of Mbingo’s final full financial year showed that growth was also translating into profit.
In 2024, FNB posted E364.7 million in pre-tax profit, its highest in the past six financial years. The bank held E9.71 billion in assets, E6.30 billion in customer deposits and E4.28 billion in gross loans.
Mbingo stepped down on December 31, 2024, after nearly a decade at the helm. Thokozani Dlamini took over the following day. The financial year ended June 2025 was therefore, split between the two chief executives, making the latest results, for the year ended June 2026, the first full financial-year picture of FNB under Dlamini.
It is now a much bigger bank. Assets have climbed to E12.07 billion, customer deposits to E8.12 billion and gross lending to E5.84 billion. In just two years, FNB has added E2.36 billion in assets, E1.82 billion in deposits and E1.56 billion in lending.
The detailed accounts also provide a window into where that lending growth was going during the transition. Between 2024 and 2025, gross advances increased by E545.6 million to E4.83 billion. About E419.5 million of that increase came through corporate and commercial lending, which grew from E3.04 billion to E3.46 billion. Retail advances increased by E126.1 million.
Within the business book, corporate banking recorded the largest increase, adding E283.5 million to reach E1.37 billion. WesBank Commercial grew by another E116.2 million. Residential mortgages, by comparison, increased by just E7.7 million.
Viewed through a different lens, the economic sectors receiving that credit, agriculture stands out. Agricultural advances increased by E407.2 million in a single year, from E1.217 billion in 2024 to E1.625 billion in 2025.
Three years earlier, FNB’s exposure to agriculture stood at E696.6 million. By the transition year, therefore, much of the growth in FNB’s lending was coming through its corporate and commercial books, while agriculture recorded the largest increase when the same advances were viewed by economic sector.
Profit was moving the other way. Pre-tax profit fell from E364.7 million in 2024 to E346.7 million during the transition year and again to E335.7 million in 2026.
That leaves the contradiction sitting at the centre of FNB’s numbers: the bank has E2.36 billion more in assets and E1.56 billion more in gross lending than in Mbingo’s final full financial year, yet produces about E29 million less in annual pre-tax profit.
The decline has not come from a shortage of business. In Dlamini’s first full year, gross lending jumped 21%, customer deposits rose about 23% and operating income increased by roughly E99 million to E1.20 billion.
The pressure came further down the income statement. Operating and administration expenses increased by approximately E105 million to E814.5 million, slightly more than the additional operating income FNB generated during the year.
It continued a pattern that first appeared during the transition year. In 2025, operating income increased by about E89.7 million, while operating expenses rose by E110.4 million.
FNB has attributed part of the higher expenditure to investment in people, infrastructure and payment platforms. Management has also said it expects some of those costs to normalise as investments mature and has introduced automation and process re-engineering initiatives.
That distinction matters. Investment can weigh on today’s profit while creating capacity intended to generate returns over a longer period. The question is what eventually comes back. For now, the pressure can be seen in FNB’s returns. Return on assets has fallen from 3% in 2024 to 2.1% in 2026, while return on equity has declined from above 21% to 17%.
Put more simply, every E100 of assets on FNB’s books is producing less profit than it did two years ago. That does not erase the growth. It puts a different measure against it.
FNB has added billions to its balance sheet and expanded lending considerably. During the transition year, much of the additional credit came through its corporate and commercial books, while agriculture recorded particularly strong growth when the loan book was viewed by economic sector.
Dlamini’s first full financial year has therefore, shown that the bank can continue expanding. What the numbers have yet to show is when that additional scale and the investment supporting it, will begin producing bigger returns.
…E216M RISE IN RUNNING COSTS
Running FNB Eswatini now costs almost E216 million more a year than it did two years ago.
Operating and administration expenses have climbed from E598.9 million in 2024 to E814.5 million in 2026, an increase of about 36%. The increase has come in two sizeable jumps.
The first came during the 2025 financial year, when expenses rose E110.4 million, or 18.4%, to E709.4 million. That increase was larger than the additional income FNB generated from its operations that year.
Operating income rose by about E89.7 million, from E1.008 billion to E1.097 billion. Pre-tax profit subsequently slipped from E364.7 million to E346.7 million.
So what became more expensive? The bank’s accounts provide part of the answer. By 2025, staff expenditure stood at E305.2 million, while technical and operational support costs reached E234.5 million. Together, the two categories amounted to almost E540 million.
The bank was also investing in changes to its payments infrastructure. FNB linked some of the higher costs to investment in people, infrastructure and payment platforms, including changes associated with Common Monetary Area low-value electronic payments and the first phase of the Eswatini Payment Switch.
Its board separately warned that regulatory changes to the way payments are processed across the industry would require “substantial” capital investment. FNB expected some of those costs to normalise over time. It also introduced an operational optimisation programme involving automation and process re-engineering.
The costs have not eased yet. In 2026, operating and administration expenses increased by another E105 million, or 14.8%, to E814.5 million. Again, the increase slightly exceeded the additional operating income generated during the year, which rose by about E99 million to E1.20 billion.
That leaves an important distinction in FNB’s numbers.
The bank is spending more partly because it is investing in systems intended to change how it operates. Higher expenditure, by itself, does not establish inefficiency.
The test comes in what those investments eventually do to the cost of generating income. That test has become more demanding. In 2024, FNB spent about 59 cents in operating costs for every lilangeni of income, reflected in a cost-to-income ratio of 59.2%. By 2025, that had risen to 63.3 cents.
The bank is on that account, carrying a substantially higher annual cost base while waiting for investments in technology, payments and processes to deliver the efficiencies management expects. Two years have added almost E216 million to FNB’s annual operating bill.
…SHAREHOLDERS SMILE AS DIVIDENDS HIT SIX-YEAR HIGH
There was barely anything separating FNB Eswatini’s profit in 2024 from the following year. Just E20 000.
The bank made E268.804 million after tax in 2024 and E268.784 million a year later. What shareholders received was anything but static.
FNB paid E190.47 million in dividends during 2025, more than double the E84.49 million paid in the previous financial year.
Viewed across six years, the movement is even more pronounced.
FNB paid E100 million in dividends in 2020, followed by E175.68 million in 2021, E138.90 million in 2022 and E157.94 million in 2023. Payments then fell to E84.49 million in Mbingo’s final full financial year before climbing to E190.47 million during the 2025 transition year.
The 2025 payment was therefore the highest of the six financial years examined, immediately after the lowest. FNB’s financial statements show that the E190.47 million comprised a final dividend of E94.71 million approved in August 2024 and an interim dividend of E95.76 million approved in February 2025.
The timing places the two decisions on either side of FNB’s leadership change. Mbingo remained chief executive officer until December 31, 2024, while Thokozani Dlamini took over on January 1, 2025. The bank said the distributions were made in line with its dividend policy, capital-management framework and outlook for internally generated capital.
The E190.47 million should not simply be treated as a distribution of the E268.78 million profit earned in 2025. Dividend declarations and payments can draw on earnings and capital accumulated across reporting periods. What the accounts establish is that substantially more cash was distributed to shareholders during the transition year than in any of the previous five financial years examined.
The bank’s ownership was changing too. FirstRand EMA Holdings held 75.01% of FNB Eswatini’s issued share capital at the end of the 2025 financial year, following the bank’s localisation and listing on the Eswatini Stock Exchange.
Dividends tell only one side of the movement of money through FNB.
The bank paid E85.997 million in cash income tax during 2025, E21.081 million below the E107.078 million paid a year earlier.
The 2024 payment was the highest in the six financial years examined. FNB paid E88.53 million in cash income tax in 2020. That fell to E55.74 million in 2021 and remained around that level at E56.02 million in 2022, before rising to E75.41 million in 2023 and E107.08 million in 2024.
It then fell to about E86 million in 2025. Those movements should not be read as though cash tax simply rises and falls alongside annual profit.
Tax payments, liabilities and prepayments can cross reporting periods, meaning the amount physically paid during a year can differ from the tax expense recognised against that year’s earnings.
In 2025, for example, FNB recognised E77.88 million in income-tax expense while physically paying E85.997 million in income tax. The tax environment also changed. The normal corporate tax rate reflected in FNB’s accounts fell from 27.5% in 2024 to 25% in 2025, while the bank’s effective tax rate declined from 24.7% to 20%.
That makes the final Mbingo year and the transition year an unusual pair. In 2024, FNB made E268.804 million after tax, paid E107.078 million in cash income tax and E84.492 million in dividends. A year later, profit was almost identical at E268.784 million. Yet cash income tax paid fell to E85.997 million, while dividends paid climbed to E190.471 million.
Over the six years examined, dividends and cash tax payments have not moved in step with profit. The latest results add another turn to that financial story. FNB’s 2026 abridged results show pre-tax profit falling for a second consecutive year, from E346.7 million in 2025 to E335.7 million, even as assets climbed 17% to E12.07 billion and both interest and non-interest income increased.
The available 2026 figures therefore, extend the profit story beyond the transition year, but without the corresponding cash-tax-paid and dividend-paid figures, they do not yet establish whether the sharp change in those two cash flows during 2025 continued.
FNB Eswatini has moved from its highest cash tax payment and lowest dividend payment of the six years examined in 2024 to a lower cash tax payment and its highest dividend payment in 2025, despite its annual after-tax profit changing by just E20 000.
