Many banks report profit growth in nine months

Many domestic banks have reported positive growth in profit in the third quarter and the first nine months of 2023 even amid the slow credit expansion and a downturn trend in profit of the whole banking sector.

The Vietnam Maritime Commercial Joint Stock Bank (MSB) posted a pre-tax profit of 5.22 trillion VND (212.41 million USD) in the first nine months of this year, completing 83% of its yearly target.

By the end of the third quarter, MSB's total assets increased by 17% compared to the end of last year to more than 249 trillion VND. Total outstanding credit increased by 17% to nearly 141.24 trillion VND, higher than the industry’s average growth rate while the bad debt ratio was kept under 2%.

Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) had also completed 75% of its pre-tax profit plan for this year as of the end of September, with pre-tax profit of more than 15 trillion VND, up over 10% year on year thanks to non-credit revenue sources.

By the end of September, ACB's total assets had risen 6.7%, reaching more than 648 trillion VND. In particular, its total loans increased by 8.7% compared to the beginning of this year, higher than the banking sector's average level, hitting nearly 450 trillion VND. At the same time, its customer deposits increased by 7.6% over the beginning of the year to 445.5 trillion VND.

At the same time, the Saigon Bank for Industry and Trade (Saigonbank) earned 248 billion VND in pre-tax profit, up 5.1% year on year, equivalent to 82.67% of its plan for the whole year thanks to its effective solutions to cut cost.

Saigonbank's total assets as of September 30, 2023 rose 7.2% to 29.68 trillion VND. Its total lending increased by 4.3% compared to the beginning of the year to 19.51 trillion VND, while deposits expanded 11.6% to reach 22.87 trillion VND.

On the contrary, many banks said that they suffered a deceleration in profits in the first nine months of this year, including Techcombank (down 17.8%), VPBank (58%), BacABank (23%), LPBank (24%), and TPBank (16%).

Analysts from SSI Securities held that declining net interest margin (NIM) coupled with the burden of provisioning due to increasing bad debt are the main reasons behind the decline in many banks' profits.

However, banking is still considered one of the sectors with positive profit growth prospects in the last quarter of the year, they said./.