The EBS said it is in late stage discussions on a joint venture with a UK building society, as it announced profits before tax up 23% to €65.9m on the back of strong lending.
The mutual society said that during the year lending increased 20% to €4.6 billion, with the overall loan book rising to €14.6 billion.
Savings increased 15% in 2006, with customers continuing to save their SSIAs, with 93% of maturing funds in the last three months being retained.
EBS said it was in advanced discussions with UK Mutual, Britannia Building Society, to form a joint venture to serve the mortgage broker market in Ireland.
Last year was the first full year during which the EBS originated mortgages in the broker market.
Britannia is the UK's second largest member owned building society, with nearly three million members and assets of £35 billion.
Chief executive Ted McGovern said the building society had achieved strong growth across all its business lines, with a continuing improvement in its efficiency, with a fall in its costs to mean assets ratio.
'This ratio is the acknowledged key measure of efficiently for a building society and now stands at 0.56%, which places EBS in the upper end of the top quartile of our international building society peer group', he said.
He said that the broker market channel will account for an even bigger proportion of the overall residential mortgage market in Ireland, and that a joint venture with Britannia will enable the EBS to fully avail of these opportunities.
He said the joint venture will benefit from EBS's local market knowledge and established distribution presence and reputation, and Britannia's experience of intermediary channels.
