Ecobank says it has taken steps to recover all loans it fears might go bad. The bank's nonperforming loans which went up significantly in 2015, still continues to be a challenge for the bank.

Its 2016 first quarter results released last week, showed that impartment charges on loans and advances shoot up from 3.3 million Ghana cedis for the first quarter in 2015 to almost 18 million cedis for first quarter of 2016.

But speaking to JOY BUSINESS after its Anual General Meeting, Acting Managing Director, Morgan Aseidu says they have come very far to ensure that the situation improves by the middle of this year.

He added that "we are hopeful that by the end of the second quarter, impairment charges should reduce significantly to under 3 percent ".

ECOBANK during the year 2015, posted some strong financial results. The Bank's total income for instance, grew by some 19 percent despite what the bank describes as a tough operating environment.

Profits before tax, also increased by 3 percent to 459 million Ghana in 2015, while total assets grew to 6.7 billion Ghana cedis from 5.8 billion, representing 16 percent increase.

According to a statement posted in the Bank's Annual Results, Former Managing Director of the Bank, Samuel Ashitey Adjei, said the bank's various business segments, namely corporate domestic and treasury contributed to this sterling performance for last year. 

At the end of the year "corporate bank's revenue was 378 million up 40 percent from a year ago ". 

Domestic Banking reported a revenue, of 420 million up by 10 percent, while Treasury reported 226 million after an 8 percent jump. 

Board Chairman of the Bank, Terence Darko noted that, last year marked its 25 years as a bank in the country.

"Our journey has been an exciting one decorated with significant milestone ". He added that "I believe our best days are ahead" .