The two mainly Portuguese-owned banks account for over half of the assets of the 16 commercial banks included in the study. BCI has 29 percent, while Millennium Bim has 27 percent.
The information is included in the “Banking Industry Survey” prepared by KPMG for the Mozambican Association of Banks based on figures from 2016. The study did not include Moza Banco as it did not respond to the survey, although it was the fourth-largest bank in Mozambique in 2015,but has since been the target of state intervention.
BCI is 51 percent owned by Portuguese state bank Caixa Geral de Depósitos (CGD) and 30 percent by BPI, while Millennium Bim is 66.6 percent owned by the largest private Portuguese bank, BCP.
The total assets of the commercial banks analysed in the survey rose 6 percent from 436 billion meticais on 31 December, 2015 to 462 billion meticais (€6.1 billion) at the end of 2016, the study showed.
Growth was slower than in previous years due to the country’s severe financial and economic crisis, it added.
Standard Bank achieved the best growth in total assets, to 19 percent of the market, the third largest share.
Together, the country’s top three commercial banks hold 73 percent of the list’s total assets, while the previous year, the top three banks accounted for 71 percent of the banking sector’s total assets.
BCI and Millenium Bim each have a 29 percent share of the loans and advances market with BCI totalling 85.7 billion meticais and BIM 84.4 billion - 62 percent of the total.
The two banks also led by deposits with 103 billion meticais at BCI and 100 billion meticais at Millennium Bim - 60 percent of the depoists held by all 16 banks in the study.
In terms of profit, Millennium Bim leads with a profit of 4.5 billion meticais, followed by Standard Bank with 2.7 billion meticais and BCI with 1.4 billion meticais.
Millennium Bim is the 10th in the list by solvency ratio with 16.62 percent and BCI is 12th with 13.99 percent. By this measure the ranking is led by Socremo Banco de Microfinanças, with a solvency ratio of 40.10 percent.
The Bank of Mozambique requires that banks have a solvency ratio of over 8 percent, which will be raised to 12 percent from 2020, according to a decision taken this year.