BDO posts record-high profit of P26.1B

BDO Unibank Inc., the banking arm of the SM group, chalked up a record high net income of P26.1 billion in 2016, citing strong results across its core businesses.

This matched the bank’s earnings guidance for the year and marked a 4.4 percent increase from the P25-billion net profit posted in 2015.

Customer loan portfolio increased by 16 percent to P1.5 trillion, while total deposits rose by 15 percent to P1.9 trillion on the sustained growth in the bank’s low-cost deposits, BDO disclosed to the Philippine Stock Exchange on Friday.

Net interest income went up by 15 percent to P65.6 billion, attributed to the good quality of growth in the loan portfolio.

Meanwhile, fee-based income grew by 15 percent to P22.2 billion, with insurance premium contributing P8 billion. BDO said its efforts at diversifying its income stream started to bear fruit. These fee income sources compensated for the decline in trading gains to P4.8 billion. Overall, gross operating income settled at P107.2 billion.

The bank’s operating expenses advanced by 27 percent to P70.1 billion, primarily reflecting the consolidation of One Network Bank (ONB) and BDO Life Insurance. Excluding these, operating expenses would have risen only by 11 percent.

The bank set aside P3.8 billion in provisions for the year even as gross non- performing loan (NPL) ratio held steady at 1.3 percent while NPL cover remained high at 139 percent.