FirstRand has said that its banking and insurance portfolio has produced a 32 percent decrease in earnings to 7.1 billion rand over the first half of 2009 until June.

"The absolute size of retail bad debts... in the residential mortgages portfolio, combined with losses emanating from the offshore legacy portfolios in the investment bank, significantly impacted overall profitability," said outgoing chief executive of FirstRand Paul Harris in an interview with Business Report.

Nevertheless, FirstRand is planning the Nigerian market. Sizwe Nxasana, the group's chief executive-designate, said the bank was waiting for the second banking consolidation in Africa's second largest oil state.

"The focus is to position FirstRand as a strong regional player. We are not looking at Greenfields project there," Nxasana said.

Harris added: "We are open for business there. The situation has been very fluid in the past couple of weeks and we want to throw our hat in the ring."

Meanwhile, experts are concerned about Nigeria's financial sector. They claim that it is facing a liquidity crisis which could "weed out some of its weaker banks and prompt a second round of consolidation," Business report said.

FirstRand is also waiting for regulatory approval for an office in Angola and has received conditional approval for an office in Nigeria.

Source: Business Report