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ZIMBABWE Asset Management Company (Zamco) has purchased $29.5 million worth of non-performing loans from Pan-African banking group BancABC, boosting Atlas Mara’s first quarter profit to $5 million.

Zamco is a special purpose vehicle set up by Government in 2014 to purchase non-performing loans from banks and clean their balance sheets.

The London-listed financial services group founded by former Barclays Plc chief executive Bob Diamond and Ugandan billionaire Ashish Thakkar, said the non-performing loans ratio for three months to March 31 was largely flat at 13,1 percent, with a target of 10 percent by the end of 2017.

Zamco’s NPLs purchase boosted its profit by $1.7 million, it said.

The quarterly report is its largest since inception, after bouncing from a loss of $6.7 million in the comparable period last year.

“In Zimbabwe we continued to implement our POS terminal roll out, resulting in 187 merchants, 463 deployed devices and achieved $5.3 million in transactions,” said Atlas in a trading update.

“BancABC reported a profit after tax of $1.8 million in the full year to December 2016, while operating income dropped by 13,3 percent to $41.6 million. — The Source