Raiffeisen Bank Romania, one of the top five banks in the local market, recorded a profit after taxes of EUR 104 million last year, up 4.5% year-on-year.

The bank’s results were impacted by two extraordinary events, namely the giving in payment law, which determined the lender to provision EUR 27 million, and the sale of the VISA Europe stake, which brought it a profit of EUR 21 million.

The bank’s total assets went up by 6%, reaching a historic high of EUR 7.38 billion, driven by higher lending. The bank’s total loans portfolio reached EUR 4.65 billion at the end of 2016, up 10% compared to end-2015.

“What makes me happiest is that we are talking about asset growth that comes mainly from our relationship with clients, from the lending activity,” said Steven van Groningen, Raiffeisen Bank Romania CEO.

The bank’s client base remained constant in 2016, consisting of some 2 million individual clients, about 100,000 SMEs, and 5,600 corporate clients. The number of branches dropped by 6.3% to 480 in 2016 whereas the number of employees went down by 2.1% to 5,322 people.

Austrian parent-group Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI) recorded a profit after taxes of EUR 574 million, up 32% over 2015.

“We managed to considerably improve our results in all regions. In particular, I would like to emphasize Southeastern Europe,” said RBI general director Karl Sevelda.

editor@romania-insider.com