Waiting for the New Zealand Labour government of Jacinda Ardern to let them know how the Crown “expresses its interest in Kiwibank” will not delay the bank’s board for long.

Lucky to be around for 21 years and three months now, Kiwibank will be fine if the Crown outright is named the owner of the bank.

Over the year to June 2022 Kiwibank reported a pre-provision profit of NZ$200 million, up $17 million on 2021 and pushing double the 2020 profit.

In FY2022 Kiwibank reported a net profit of NZ$132 million, up NZ$5 million and a record for the bank.

The bank will pay a dividend of NZ$17 million to its three Crown shareholders, of which New Zealand Post remains foremost.

The bank has total liabilities of NZ$29.4 billion and net assets of NZ$2.2 billion, up $700 million over four years. Of this, $246 million is from the issue of new perpetual preference shares during the year.

Receivables were $28.8 billion at June 2022, up from $25.3 billion a year before.

Net interest income for the bank at $636 million this year is a tasty gain from $528 million a year earlier.

The return on equity of Kiwibank is six per cent and the return on assets 0.5 per cent.

In April 2022, Moody’s Investors Service affirmed Kiwibank’s credit rating at A1 with a stable outlook for senior unsecured debt obligations.

In October 2021, Fitch Ratings affirmed Kiwibank’s credit rating at AA with a stable outlook for senior unsecured debt obligations payable in New Zealand dollars, and a credit rating of AA- with a positive outlook for senior unsecured debt obligations payable in other currencies.