Chairman of Scotia Investment Jamaica Limited (SIJL) Jeffery Hall shared his thoughts on the company’s performance in 2016 after he acknowledged and thanked retired directors Mr. Bruce Bowen and Mr. Anthony Chang for their valuable contributions and services to SIJL. The Chairman noted, “the 2016 financial year, was a successful one for SIJL. The outturn for the year reflects the impact of the strategy embarked upon several years ago, to focus resources and our expertise on becoming the market leading asset management, brokerage firm.” The strategy undertaken required the company to divert away from the traditional balance sheet business model while upholding its consistent application of sound risk management practices and careful management of structural costs.

Following the opening comments and thoughts on the 2016 performance, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Mr. Lissant Mitchell dug a little deeper into the company’s performance as he started with the financial highlights for the year which included:

· Net profit increasing 32% to $1.35 billion.

· Earnings per share rose to $3.19.

· Total assets grew from $68.85 billion in 2015 to $71.20 billion for 2016.

· SIJL saw a 13% increase in its asset management line due to “SIJL’s long term strategic objective to focus on fee and commission based revenue sources”.

Over the last fiscal year, SIJL embarked on a transition period which saw the company executing various structural cost realignment initiatives. Mr. Mitchell stated, “We embarked on some business lines realignment which will contribute to overall cost savings in the future.” Throughout the year, the CEO noted the company manoeuvred through several challenges but remained committed to the long term vision of generating revenues in a diversified manner. This highlights the company’s commitment to its Business Continuity Plan (BCP). SIJL’s business continuity plan ensures robust and effective structure is in place to guarantee the business is able to recover from pandemics, disasters and disruptions in short time without significant impact to its operations and client experience.

Looking ahead to 2017 Lissant Mitchell noted the fiscal trajectory of the country continues to head in the right direction with the signing of the 36 month standby agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). He stated, “inflation levels remain manageable and the rate of depreciation on the exchange rate has slowed significantly. These favourable indicators are contributing to increased business and consumer confidence and will impact customers positively. For 2017 Scotia Investment Jamaica Limited’s main focus will be:

· Customer Focus: To deepen relationships with customers by placing them at the heart of everything SIJL’s does.

· Business Mix Alignment: Knowing customers to anticipate and proactively provide value added services and solutions to their needs. Mr. Mitchell noted this will entail, “enhancing the product suite for retail and institutional clientele.”

· Leadership and Enhancement of Team Members’ Engagement: Build leadership capacity and bench strength, as the company continues to develop a comprehensive leadership development plan for current and future leaders.

· Structural Cost Transformation: Optimizing operations. The focus here will be on cementing the implementation of the new operating system, completing the alignment of workflows and processes, and consolidating all asset management activities within SIJL, to gain maximum efficiency.

· Digital Transformation: Differentiate and enhance customer experience through innovation. SIJL is aiming to become the digital leader in sales, marketing, engagement and customer convenience. According to the CEO, “We intend to implement the appropriate technologies to support the aggressive growth of our asset management business in Jamaica and across the region, as well as to implement supporting tools to improve our Advisors’ interaction with our clients.”

In closing the Chairman recognized the continued support from shareholders, and thanked all staff members for their effort and hailed the guidance of the Board of Director which contributed to the success of SIJL.