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Everbright Bank profit up 22%

By Luo Jun (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-02-16 10:08

China Everbright Bank Ltd, the last Chinese lender to receive a government bailout, said profit rose 22 percent last year as it extended more loans and collected more fees from services such as asset management.

A China Everbright Bank stand at an exhibition in Shanghai.

Lending expanded by 16 percent in 2006, taking total loans outstanding to 352.4 billion yuan, Beijing-based Everbright Bank said in a statement. The State-controlled company didn't give a figure for net income.

"Everbright Bank has grown nicely in the past two years, thanks to being an innovator in asset management products," said Zhang Xi, a Beijing-based analyst at China Galaxy Securities Co. "That gave it the means to tackle problems including weak asset quality and capital deficiency."

Everbright Bank joined Shenzhen Development Bank Co and other publicly traded lenders in reporting higher earnings after China's economy in 2006 grew at the fastest pace in 11 years. Chinese banks advanced 3.18 trillion yuan of new loans in 2006, 15 percent more than a year earlier.

Shenzhen Development Bank, controled by US buyout firm Newbridge Capital LLC, last month said 2006 profit at least quadrupled. China Merchants Bank Co said net income last year surged more than 50 percent, and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank Co posted a 31 percent gain. Beijing-based China Minsheng Banking Corp said 2006 profit probably rose 40 percent and Huaxia Bank estimated 13 percent growth.

Everbright Bank won approval to receive at least 15 billion yuan from the Central Huijin Investment Co in December to strengthen its balance sheet before an initial public offering, people familiar with the plan said.

The government wants Everbright Bank's capital adequacy ratio, a measure of financial strength, to reach the minimum requirement of 8 percent by the end of this year. The recapitalization will pave the way for the nation's eighth-largest bank to sell a stake to strategic investors before an IPO this year that may raise at least $1 billion, people familiar with the deal said last month.

Everbright Bank's capital adequacy ratio stood at 4.65 percent at the end of 2003, the last time it published an annual report.