Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - Despite thecentral bank’s tightened monetary policy, many banks reported good businessperformance last year thanks to improved bad debt resolution and rising incomefrom services.

Vietcombank Chairman Nghiem Xuan Thanh said his bank’s 2018 pre-tax profit hita record high of 18 trillion VND (773 million USD), surging a whopping 63 percentagainst 2017 despite the central bank’s credit slowdown.

Vietcombank’s outstanding loans last year fell 14.9 percent to more than 635trillion VND, lower than the 17.2 percent rate of 2017.

The impressive result was attributed to the bank’s success in controllingcredit quality and boosting service segments. Vietcombank’s non-performingloans (NPLs) accounted for only 0.97 percent of outstanding loans by the end of2018 – the lowest level among local banks – while its retail credit proportionrose from 39.6 percent in 2017 to 46.2 percent in 2018.

With the impressive results in 2018, Thanh said Vietcombank has set a profittarget of 20 trillion VND for 2019. It will continue efforts to be listed asthe leading bank in Vietnam as well as a top 100 bank in the region and top 300in the world.

Agribank also reported accelerated performance last year with an impressivepre-tax profit of 7.53 trillion VND, aided by bad debt reduction to 2.78 percentand rising service revenue of 20 percent.

According to Agribank Chairman Trinh Ngoc Khanh, with nearly 20 trillion VND setaside for risk provisions, it will be feasible for the bank to repurchase allNPLs that it sold to the Vietnam Asset Management Company (VAMC) as well asdeal with new NPLs that arise in 2019.

Along with large State-owned banks, private banks also reported positiveperformance last year.

TPBank boasted an impressive pre-tax profit of 2.26 trillion VND, double that in 2017.

VIB’s profit skyrocketed by 176 percent year-on-year to 1.72 trillion VND,following great efforts to tackle NPLs. VIB was among the few banks thatresolved all bad debts at the VAMC in July so it did not have to spendprovision costs on bad debts. 

Though credit growth was only 14 percent in 2018, Sacombank’s profit stillincreased sharply to 2.2 trillion VND, up 47 percent against 2017 and 20 percenthigher than the target set by the bank’s general meeting of shareholders.

Sacombank’s mobilised capital in 2018 reached 364 trillion VND, up 12 percentfrom the previous year, while its credit growth rose by 14 percent to 258trillion VND and the bad debt ratio declined to below 3 percent.

According experts, banks gained high profits despite the credit slowdownbecause they have promoted non-credit revenues and focused on higher marginbusiness segments such as retail credit.

In addition, a decrease in NPLs also contributed significantly to profits lastyear.-VNS/VNA