China Banking Corp., the eighth-largest lender in terms of assets, said consolidated net income in the first nine months jumped 31 percent to P4.84 billion from a year ago, on strong lending and fee-based businesses.
China Bank said in a disclosure to the stock exchange the nine-month profit translated into a return on equity of 10.47 percent and a return on assets of 1.19 percent.
“We are pleased to note that our core business drivers continue to show robust growth,” China Bank president and chief executive Ricardo Chua said in a statement.
“These positive results indicate that we are on track to meet our business goals for this year, especially with the turnaround of our China Bank Savings subsidiary into a significant contributor to group profitability,” he said.
Total operating income grew 16 percent to P16.46 billion, with net interest income up 9 percent year-on-year to P12.26 billion, driven by the 19-percent growth in loan portfolio.
Fee-based revenues climbed 42 percent to P4.21 billion from last year‘s P2.96 billion, bolstered by trading and securities gains which surged 226 percent to P1.19 billion.
Service charges, fees and commissions rose 13 percent while income from acquired assets went up 123 percent.
Net interest margin was at 3.22 percent. China Bank said the growth of operating expenses was controlled at 9 percent to P10.08 billion even as the bank continued to strengthen its operations with new investments and more branches, ATMs and human resource complement.
Total assets expanded 20 percent year-on-year to P564.79 billion, in tandem with the growth of the bank‘s core businesses. Net loans climbed 19 percent to P343.10 billion, driven by the solid 24-percent growth in consumer loans.
Total deposits grew 21 percent to P472.77 billion.
