) reported a 22% fall in second-quarter net profit on Thursday after shoring up loan loss allowances in a pandemic-hit market, but its profit came just above market estimates and rose from the preceding quarter.
Piyush Gupta, CEO of Southeast Asia’s biggest lender, said in a statement that the operating trends were in line with the bank’s guidance and several fee income streams were improving from troughs in April as economies emerge from lockdowns. Investors are keen to see if the June quarter marked the trough for banks’ net interest margins, a key measure of profitability, and whether lenders can effectively tackle loan losses in recession-hit economies.
The profit was above the first-quarter’s S$1.16 billion number. Loan loss allowances also declined quarter on quarter.