Sberbank does not plan major amendments to amount, frequency of dividend payments - Gref

MOSCOW. Nov 7 (Interfax) - Sberbank does not plan to amend the amount and frequency of dividend payments substantially, and the lending institution intends to announce the parameters of the new dividend policy in December, CEO Herman Gref told reporters.

"We are very conservative in terms of assuming obligations and then fulfilling them, thus we are not planning any major changes in the dividend policy. I think that we will continue to pursue our policy in the same vein as we have previously, including as also applies to the amount, and this of also applies of course to interim dividends," Gref said.

Gref noted that the supervisory board on December 5 would consider the matter of approving the new dividend policy, whose main provisions the bank will announce at Investor Day on December 6.

"We pay much in dividends; no one pays at such volumes. Of course, the volume of our dividends depends on the adequacy of our capital and the risk appetite established by the supervisory board. This is the key factor. The long-term sustainability of the bank is an absolutely prevailing topic for us," Gref emphasized.

It was previously reported that the Russian government, as the main shareholder in Sberbank, expects the lending institution to pay out dividends "of at least 50%" of net profit for 2023.

Sberbank plans to receive record net profit in 2023. The bank received 1.149 trillion rubles in net profit to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in 9M 2023. Based on the results, the bank has raised its forecast for return on equity from "above 22%" to "above 24%" for the current year.

Sberbank saw IFRS net profit plummet to 270.5 billion rubles in 2022 from a record net profit of 1.246 trillion rubles in 2021.

Sberbank in mid-September confirmed its intention to allocate at least 50% of profits to dividends. The bank does not plan to reduce the level, though it is too soon to talk about increasing it, Gref said at the time.

Meanwhile, the lending institution wishes to maintain the trend of increasing dividends per share going forward, Taras Skvortsov, Sberbank vice president and director of the finance department, said in early October.

The amount of dividends per share has increased nearly 1.6-fold over the past five years, with the bank paying out dividends of 16 rubles per share for 2018, 18.70 rubles per share for 2019, 18.70 rubles per share for 2020, and 25 rubles per share for 2022. Sberbank did not pay dividends for 2021, meaning in 2022.

Sberbank allocated a record 565 billion rubles at 25 rubles per share to pay out dividends for 2022.

The Russian government is the main shareholder of Sberbank with 50% plus one (+1) share and 52.32% of the votes.