Safe deposits
BZ WBK, for example, earned a zł.324.4-million net profit in the second quarter, compared with zł.298 million in Q2 2007. The group's H1 net profit reached zł.567.5 million on revenues of zł.1.653 billion, marking y/y growth of 1.6 percent and 12 percent respectively. The factors behind this growth included cash loan products, mortgage loans and leasing liabilities.
At the same time, however, the capital group's operating costs also rose, reaching zł.845.3 million in H1 - 17.8 percent higher than in the same period of 2007.
According to Michał Sobolewski, an analyst from brokerage IDMSA, BZ WBK's results were strongly driven by interest revenues and surprised the market positively. "Especially as net fee income recovered faster than expected," he said.
Sobolewski assessed BRE Bank group's results more neutrally, noting that the figures were in line with expectations. The bank recorded a zł.289.5-million net profit in Q2, compared with zł.181.1 million the year before.
"Here the situation is good, especially in the retail sector," Sobolewski said.
The bank's ratio of costs to revenues decreased to 47.5 percent in Q2, down from 53.4 percent the year before. But total administrative costs grew 17.6 percent y/y, with the highest growth recorded in labor costs.
Finalizing a fusion
Pekao, which claims to be the largest bank in the CEE region in terms of market capitalization, turned in a net profit of zł.830 million on revenues of zł.2.026 billion in the second quarter. Its net profit for H1 stood at zł.1.967 billion, marking 7.9-percent y/y growth.
The bank's total operational costs reached zł.964 million - 3.9 percent more than in the first quarter of 2008.
Sobolewski said that Pekao's results weren't impressive. This was understandable, he noted, because the bank had been busy overseeing the final stage of its fusion with the larger part of Bank BPH.
Rebuilding
If Pekao was busy digesting part of BPH, the remainder of the bank - the so-called "mini-BPH" - was working to rebuild its position in the market, Sobolewski noted. At the end of June, BPH began merging with GE Money, a process it should complete by June 2009.
In Q2, the bank saw a net profit of zł.28.5 million and a gross profit of 44.8 million, while the first half of the year brought the bank a zł.76-million net profit and a zł.113-million gross profit.
Since the beginning of the year, the institution has launched eight own and 89 partnership outlets and increased its workforce from 494 to over 3,600. The bank has around 656,000 individual clients - 30,000 more than at the end of 2007. In the second half of the year, BPH expects to attract a further 40,000-55,000 clients.
The bank is also developing its corporate-sector offer. It served 700 companies at the end of June and wants to increase this number to 1,200 by the end of the year.
