The Board of Directors of Sindh Bank in their meeting held on March 7, 2018, reviewed and approved the Audited Financial statements of the Bank for the year ended December 31, 2017. During 2017, as per the trend in past years, the Bank registered growth in deposits, advances. Deposits increased by 12.8 % and stood at Rs 134.2 Billion as compared to Rs 119.0 Billion on December 31, 2016 and Gross Advances rose by 23.5% to Rs 69.1 Billion as compared to Rs 56.0 Billion as on December 31, 2016. The Bank’s pre-tax profit for the year 2017 amounted to Rs 2,182.4 Million while profit after tax amounted to Rs 1,255.8 Million. Bank’s core profitability during 2017 increased by a healthy 35% over 2016. Sindh Bank’s branch network in 2017 expanded to 300 on-line branches in 151cities/towns all over Pakistan becoming the only bank to achieve this figure in a short period of less than 7 years. This includes14 branches dedicated to providing Islamic Banking services and 13 Islamic Banking windows, providing a wide range of market based Shariah Complaint products and services. Another 30 branches are planned to be opened during 2018 to enable the Bank to expand its network/reach. The ATM network of the Bank now stands at 245. A new functionality has been added to all the Bank’s ATMs which can now read Chip based Cards, including International such cards as VISA, MASTERCARD. The Bank already has a state of the art SMS Banking service where the customers can enjoy various facilities and now another long awaited feature has been added which enables the Bank’s customer to pay utility bills, mobile top-up etc on a 24/7 basis. The Bank’s Long-Term Rating stands at AA (Double A) with a Stable Outlook while Short-Term Rating is A-1+ (A One Plus), the highest in the class. Published in Daily Times, March 10th 2018.