Romanian lender BCR ups loan portfolio by 10%, net profit impacted by one-off charge

BCR, the second-biggest lender in Romania by assets, part of Austrian group Erste, recorded a 10% increase in the total stock of loans from September 2018 until September 2019, to RON 39.5 billion (EUR 8.4 bln). The group’s operational results also improved significantly in the first nine months of this year, but the bottom line was impacted by a one-off provision related to the housing loans division – BCR Banca pentru Locuinte (BCR-BpL).

BCR granted new loans worth RON 5.8 billion (EUR 1.2 bln) to households and micro-businesses and RON 5.4 billion (EUR 1.1 bln) to corporate clients in the first nine months of 2019.

The operating result improved by 7.8% to RON 1.3 billion (EUR 278 million) in the first nine months, supported by better operating income partly offset by higher deposit insurance in 2019. However, BCR registered a net profit of RON 348.8 million (EUR 73.6 million) in January-September 2019, a third of the RON 1 billion (EUR 218 million) net profit recorded in the same period of 2018, due to the significant one-off provision (EUR 150 mln) allocation related to the activity of BCR Banca pentru Locuinte booked in Q2 2019.

A court decision obliges the two local housing banks, BCR Banca pentru Locuinte and Raiffeisen Banca pentru Locuinte, to pay back to the state the premiums received for their clients’ savings because of legislation breaches.

(Photo source: BCR Facebook page)