The large banks saw additional income from the sale of their stakes in Visa Europe last year, so this year’s profit would have been higher had the one-off items’ impact not been considered.
Except for BCR, all the big banks posted higher income than in the previous year.
BRD, the third leading lender by assets, posted the highest net profit, more than RON1 billion in January-September, almost double the year-ago period. The net profit was generated by the freeing up of RON271 million worth of provisions and lending. Leaving out the effect of the freed up provisions, BRD’s January-September 2017 profit was 32% higher.
Second most profitable lender was Banca Transilvania, also the second leading lender by assets. It posted RON779 million profit in the first nine months of 2017, RON264 million less than BRD and about 19% more than in the year-ago period. This is nothing out of the ordinary, considering past results. In 2015, it posted a record profit of RON2.4 billion, following takeover of local operations of Volksbank.
BCR, the largest bank by assets, ranked third by profit, which was lower in the first nine months of 2017 than in the same time in 2016. BCR group posted RON560 million net profit, half of January-September 2016 profit.
The other top five lenders are Raiffeisen and UniCredit groups, more than RON300 million each. (EUR1=RON4.6387)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)