BDO en route to P 42-B full-year profit, says exec

Based on its earnings momentum in the first three quarters, the country’s largest lender, BDO Unibank, may deliver P42 billion in net profit this full year, nearing its prepandemic level.

This is according to BDO’s chief investment officer Frederico Ocampo, who spoke at the Inquirer webinar “Stocks in Focus” on Friday.

Looking at BDO’s third quarter earnings result, Ocampo said BDO was “on track” to reach about P42 billion in net income, approximating earnings levels last seen in 2019.

BDO had posted P44.19 billion in net profit in 2019, which declined to P28.25 billion last year due to large provisioning expense arising from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The bank has already delivered P32.4 billion in net profit at end-September, up by 95 percent year-on-year, driven mostly by lower loan loss provisioning alongside higher fee-based earnings. This nine-month figure accounted for about 89.5 percent of the P36.2-billion bottom line that the market expects BDO to deliver, based on Bloomberg consensus forecasts, for the whole of 2021.

Nine-month loan loss provisioning declined to P10.44 billion from P23.83 billion in the same period last year, when the domestic economy suffered its worst recession in history as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted businesses.

—Doris Dumlao-Abadilla INQ

Project Rebound is an advocacy campaign that seeks to help Filipinos overcome the crisis through relevant and timely information they can use to make informed decisions. It is supported by Aboitiz Group, Bank of the Philippine Islands, Citi, Coca-Cola Beverages Philippines, Inc., MediCard Philippines, Inc., and Toyota Motor Philippines Corporation.