Manx Financial turns corner into the black

Investors piled into small cap bank Manx Financial as it bounced back into the black in the first half of the year. Executive Chairman Jim Mellon, a well-known entrepreneur and fund manager, said the company had turned a corner and confirmed the bottom line total comprehensive income was lifted from a £0.57m loss to £0.26m for six months to end June, with a pre-tax profit of £0.31m from a previous £0.72m loss. Mellon said the improvement was not solely driven by the cost reduction exercise undertaken last year but by a significant growth in sustainable income. The group, which operates through Conister Bank and financial advisers Edgewater Associates, increased net interest income 44% to £3.68m.Loans were increased 23% to £64.9m and customer deposits 18% to £67.9m, with the deposit-to-loan ratio improved from 92% at the end of 2012 to 96%.Conister Bank increased earnings on a like-for-like basis by 6.3 times to £1.01m, mostly from lending. Mellon stressed that this was not bolstered by one-off adjustments and will, he believed, "be sustainable in this economic environment".He bemoaned that the company's market capitalisation was less than shareholder equity, when the results were published, which was £7.97m.After shares in Manx rose 46% to 9.5p at 14:39 on Tuesday, having topped 12p in earlier trading, the market cap stood at £10.7m.OH