VIENNA: Austria's Erste Group, a major lender in central and eastern Europe, said Monday that first-quarter net profit fell 49.1 percent to a "solid" 176.2 million euros ($230.4 million).
With the year-earlier period boosted by one-off effects, this was a "solid result against the backdrop of limited economic growth and continuously declining interest rates," chief executive Andreas Treichl said.
"Erste Group expects a slight improvement in economic performance for Central and Eastern Europe in the second half of 2013," the bank said, forecasting a "stable" operating result for the year.
Net interest income slipped 7.2 percent to 1.2 billion euros, mostly because of "subdued" credit demand, low interest rates and the continuing impact of the reduction of non-core assets.
Provisioning for bad loans however fell 30.7 percent to 402.2 million euros, while pretax income was down 38.1 percent at 301.4 million euros.
Erste has around 17 million customers in eight countries.
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