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Banks announce encouraging business results for first half
Commercial banks have reported satisfactory profit for the first half of 2009, forecasting that the fulfillment of their yearly business plans is within reach.
On July 1, Maritime Bank became the first member of the banking system to officially announce its business results for the first six months of 2009.
Maritime Bank’s pretax profit was reportedly 473billion dong, or 26 percent of its average chartered capital. “If the economic conditions stay as stable as currently, it is very likely that Maritime Bank’s actual profit will exceed its yearly business plan,” the bank stated.
Maritime Bank has total assets of 46 trillion dong, an increase of 143 percent over the beginning of the year, while total mobilised capital has reached 43 trillion dong.
In fact, commercial banks all expected that their profit would be satisfactory after announcing good business results for the first five months of the year.
Vietcombank is leading banks in terms of absolute profit value. Just before Vietcombank’s shares debuted on the HCM City Stock Exchange on June 30, Vietcombank’s managers forecast that pretax profit would reach 2,400 billion dong in the first six months of the year.
Meanwhile, Eximbank has reported a breakthrough in profit in June which could help the bank obtain 900 billion dong in pretax profit (the figure was 674 billion dong in the first five months of the year). An Eximbank leader said that one of the advantages of the bank was profuse and cheap capital which has helped it develop its credit.
Though a newcomer in the market, Lien Viet Bank has also reported good business results. Lien Viet Bank’s General Director Nguyen Duc Huong on July 1 said that the bank expects to have 340 billion dong in pretax profit in the first half of 2009, mostly from services and banking derivatives (80 percent).
Interest from loans accounted for a big proportion of the total profit of banks in the first six months of the year, at an average around 60 percent. This proves to coincide with the banks’ policies on strengthening credit set earlier this year.
As for listed banks, besides waiting to hear from Vietcombank, investors are awaiting the official announcements of two other big names, Sacombank and ACB. The two banks had previously announced profit considered ‘modest’ in comparison with their yearly plans. However, the announced figures did not include ‘contributions’ of member companies.
Reports by commercial banks show that in the first six months of the year they gradually ‘escaped’ from the capital they mobilised at high cost in 2008, when deposit interest rates were between 18-19 percent per annum. Sacombank, for example, said that it had ‘disposed’ of this kind of capital in February 2009.
Regarding interest rates and income from credit, in May and June, some banks raised VND deposit interest rates to 9 percent or even 10 percent. As the basic interest rate remains unchanged at 7 percent per annum, experts have warned that with deposit interest rates up, the margin interest rates of banks will be lower.
The overall picture of the banking sector’s performance in the first half of the year will be clearer when other banks announce their profit in the coming days. However, it is clear that commercial banks are having a relatively smooth 2009 following a tough 2008.
vietnamnet, vneconomy
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