Banca Transilvania's profit picks up speed

Banca Transilvania, the biggest bank held by domestic private investors, made 84.39 million RON (23.7 million euros) profit in the first nine months. Income in the first three quarters is 15% higher in RON than in the same time last year. Gross profit three quarters into the year stood at 92.99 million RON (26.3 million euros), up 15% again in RON compared with September last year.
“We had a 10% increase in gross profit and a 13% increase in net profit in the first six months. Now we have annual growth of 15% for both gross and net profit. One can see it picked up speed,” Robert Rekkers, BT chief executive told ZIARUL FINANCIAR. He avoided providing a full-year profit target, though.
“It was a year of volatility and I don’t know what is going to happen if the NBR raises the interest rate. I hope we will maintain the growth we posted after the first nine months,” Rekkers said. The assets of the bank have gone up by 38% since the beginning of the year, reaching 6.8 billion RON. Converted into euros, the assets of the bank rose by 44% to 1.93 billion euros.
The difference in pace is a result of the RON appreciating against the euro during this period.
The expansion of assets was driven by growth in the volume of loans, which increased by 48.7% since the beginning of the year, to 4.4 billion RON (1.24 billion euros). Rekkers says he “saw an extremely fast-paced development” on the retail and small and medium-sized enterprise segments, while growth on the corporate segment was more moderate.
The amounts attracted from clients were somewhat slower to progress, reaching 4.75 billion RON at the end of September, 36.5% more than at the beginning of the year.
Just like last year, the bank has successfully combined fast-paced business development with profit growth again.
Still, the profit growth by September this year compared with September last year, 15%, is much lower than what BT posted last autumn. The year-on-year profit had gone up by almost 72% back then.
Nine months into the year, Banca Transilvania has over 300 branches, attaining the level it had targeted by yearend. Currently the company is operating 320 branches and Rekkers says 20 more are planned for opening by the end of the year.
BT had managed to consolidate its market share in the first six months, which went up by almost 0.5% to 4.3%. Under the circumstances, BT made it into the ranking of the top ten players in the system, ranking ninth.
It remains to be seen whether the expansion of assets in the third quarter will be enough to increase its market share. Thus far, other major banks are yet to announced their results.
BRD-SocGen, the second largest player in the system, will publish its financial results on November 14.
BCR, the biggest bank in the system, revealed its eight-month financials early last month. Its profit at the end of August stood at 178 million euros, an increase of 50.2% from the same time last year. The assets of the bank had gone up to 11.5 billion euros by the end of August, almost 24% higher than in 2005.