imageKUALA LUMPUR: Malayan Banking Bhd (Maybank), Malaysia's largest bank by assets, posted on Wednesday an 8 percent fall in third-quarter profit, mainly hurt by lower non-interest income and weakness at its insurance businesses.

Net profit for July-September was 1.61 billion ringgit ($480.60 million) compared with 1.75 billion ringgit a year earlier, Maybank said in a stock exchange filing.

Revenue rose 8 percent to 8.9 billion ringgit.

"The group expects its financial performance for the financial year ending Dec. 31, 2014 to be in line with the industry," the company said in notes accompanying its stock filing.

Maybank, like closest rival CIMB Group Holdings Bhd , saw fewer large initial public offerings in July-September as well as loan growth slowed by rising interest rates and central bank measures to curb household debt.

CIMB reported on Nov. 18 a 16 percent fall in third-quarter net profit.

At Maybank, net interest income - revenue from borrowers after deducting interest paid to depositors - climbed 3 percent to 2.46 billion ringgit.

Non-interest income fell 6.1 percent to 1.4 billion ringgit.

Shares of Maybank ended 0.8 percent higher to close at 9.67 ringgit per share ahead of the earnings announcement, compared with a 0.2 percent gain in the benchmark index.

The counter has lost 3.5 percent year-to-date, underperforming the benchmark's 1.5 decline.

Copyright Reuters, 2014

Comments

Comments are closed.