South Africa’s Standard Bank reports 4% rise in annual profit

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – Africa’s biggest lender by assets, Standard Bank, on Thursday reported annual profit rose by 4% and declared a final dividend of 763 cents a share.

South Africa-based Standard Bank said headline earnings rose to 44.5 billion rand ($2.42 billion) in the year ended December 31 versus 42.9 billion rand in the previous year.

($1 = 18.3709 rand)

(Reporting by Nqobile Dludla; Editing by Christopher Cushing)