KEY FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE INDICES AND THE BUSINESS GROWTH OF DEPOSIT MONEY BANKS IN NIGERIA: EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE OF WEMA BANK PLC

ABSTRACTS The study is an empirical examination of key financial performance indices and business growth of Deposit Money Banks (DMBs) with reference to Wema Bank Plc. It is assumed that key financial performance indices like liquidity, profitability, capital adequacy, asset quality and activity ratios could have effect on the business growth of Wema Bank Plc. To ascertain this, a sample size of 28 was selected and the research covered a period of 10 years (2014 – 2023). Judgmental sampling technique was adopted in the study while multiple regression analysis was adopted to analyzed the research hypothesis which was computed from data obtained from the Annual Reports of Wema Bank Plc. The study tested for the relationship between liquidity ratio, profitability ratio, capital adequacy ratio, asset quality ratio and activity ratio and the profit of the year, all from the annual report. All variable examined were found to be statistically significant as they all negative relationship with the profit for the year. The finding from the analysis shows that there is no significance relationship between the financial indices on the business growth of Wema Bank. However, the analysis effect of key financial indices on the business growth of Wema Bank showed that affects the growth of business of Wema Bank. The study recommends among other that the key financial indices should be monitored monthly as they are financial indicators that point to the business growth of DMBs.