AB DNB Bankas, part of Norway's largest financial services group, earned a pre-tax profit of LTL 17.7 million in the first three months of 2014, up from LTL 13.3 million in the same period a year ago.

The bank’s profit after taxes in the first three months of the year came at LTL 14.1 million compared to 13.3 million in the same period the year before. The results are unaudited and calculated in accordance with the International Financial Reporting Standards.

“In line with the country’s growing economy we enjoyed a continuous, albeit still modest, growth of demand for financial services. That opened the door of opportunity for us to further increase our business volumes in all the preferred segments and earn higher lending and non-lending income. The faster growth was somewhat trimmed by emerging difference between markedly stronger economic sentiment of individual customers that supported strongly the demand for mortgage loans as well as other financial services and more cautious approach of some businesses, particularly those oriented to export markets, who chose to temporarily shelve their investment or business expansion plans following neighbouring county’s import restrictions on some local goods and tensions related to events in Ukraine,” said Bjornar Lund, CEO of AB DNB Bankas commenting of the results for the first quarter of 2014.

As of the end of March AB DNB Bankas had extended credits to individual and corporate customers worth LTL 9.36 billion, i.e. its net loan portfolio rose 5.0 percent year-on-year. The rise was determines by increasing financing volumes both to legal entities and private customers that rose respectively 5.3 and 4.6 percent year-on-year.

The deposit portfolio of AB DNB Bankas rose 6.3 percent year-on-year to LTL 6.33 billion reflecting increasing number of customers and their funds on the bank’s accounts,. Thanks to the consistent implementation of the customer centric business model the number of customers increased by 37.5 thousand year-on-year. As of the end of March, AB DNB Bankas was providing financial services to 832 thousand individual and corporate customers.

In line with growth of lending volumes, the net interest income of AB DNB Bankas rose 3.8 percent year on year to LTL 52.9 million in the first three months of the year. The bank’s net commission income rose 10.8 percent to 23.3 million reflecting growing number of the bank’s customers and their increased usage of the bank’s services.

Operating and other expenses of the Bank amounted to LTL 67.43 million in the first three months of 2014. Due to consistent focus on operating efficiency they were LTL 4.5 million or 6.3 percent lower compared to the corresponding period a year ago.

AB DNB Bankas’ assets increased 5.1 percent year-on-year and as of the end of March amounted to LTL 12.1 billion. 

Due to proper risk management the bank met all prudential requirements of the Bank of Lithuania.

Norway’s DNB financial group's operating results of Q1 2014 are available on www.dnb.no.

Information about AB DNB Bankas' six months results are scheduled to be released on 10 July.

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