BRAC Bank has become the only Bangladeshi lender included in Forbes’ inaugural World’s Top Performing 500 Banks ranking, which assesses banks on financial performance rather than customer surveys.
The 2026 list, produced with market research firm Statista, selected 500 banks from 89 countries and assessed them on profitability, growth and earnings quality, capital and funding resilience and asset quality and efficiency.
BRAC Bank was placed in Tier 5, which groups banks with assets of $10 billion to $20 billion.
Of the 115 banks in the category, BRAC Bank ranked 73rd.
“This is a proud and meaningful milestone for BRAC Bank and Bangladesh. Being the first Bangladeshi bank featured in Forbes’ 2026 list is a recognition of our collective journey, BRAC Bank Managing Director and CEO Tareq Refat Ullah Khan said.
The recognition comes as the bank reported a 57 per cent year-on-year increase in net profit after tax to Tk1,423 crore in the first half of 2026 from Tk906 crore a year earlier.
Its 2025 net profit after tax was Tk2,251 crore, also up about 57 per cent year-on-year.
At the end of June, BRAC Bank’s consolidated return on assets stood at 1.67 per cent and return on equity at 21.52 per cent, while its cost-to-income ratio was 42 per cent.
Its non-performing loan ratio stood at 2.03 per cent in the first half, while the bank held Tk10,340 crore in regulatory capital, comprising Tier 1 and Tier 2 capital. The bank said this was the highest among Bangladeshi banks.
Its capital-to-risk weighted assets ratio was 15.81 per cent at the end of June, above the 12.5 per cent minimum regulatory requirement, while its advance-to-deposit ratio stood at 59.94 per cent.
Customer deposits reached Tk100,915 crore at the end of August. Deposits had grown 29 per cent year-on-year at the end of 2025.
BRAC Bank also holds international credit ratings of B+ from S&P Global Ratings and B2 from Moody’s.
The bank’s ambition goes beyond financial performance.
“We want to build the most impactful bank in Bangladesh—creating meaningful financial, economic and social impact across the country,” Khan told TIMES of Bangladesh.
He believes that good governance, transparency and trust must remain at the heart of this journey.
“We are deeply grateful to our Board, customers, regulators and all our colleagues for their continued trust, dedication and contribution in making this recognition possible” he added.
Unlike Forbes’ previous World’s Best Banks study, which is primarily based on customer surveys, the new ranking uses financial data sourced through providers including the S&P Capital IQ platform, desk research and submissions from banks.
Profitability carried 30 per cent weight in the assessment, while capital and funding resilience and asset quality and efficiency each accounted for 25 per cent. The quality of growth and earnings carried the remaining 20 per cent weight.
Banks were divided into six asset-size tiers before being assessed against similarly sized peers. Institutions needed more than $3 billion in assets and at least three consecutive years of financial data, among other eligibility requirements.
The final list included 26 banks from India, four from Pakistan, three from Sri Lanka and one from the Maldives, alongside BRAC Bank from Bangladesh.
Nepal, Bhutan and Afghanistan had none.
