Viet Nam’s Export Import Commercial Joint Stock Bank (Eximbank) posted a pre-tax profit of VND1.017 trillion (US$44.6 million) last year.

This marked a year-on-year increase of 160.5 per cent and exceeded the yearly target by 70 per cent.

The growth in Eximbank’s profit in 2017 is not attributed to its core business activities but to mainly irregular income from divestment and bad debt settlement.

Eximbank sold Sacombank’s shares in December 2017 and earned a portion of the profit, amounting to VND126 billion. Bad debt recovered in the fourth quarter of 2017 brought some VND400 billion profit for the bank.

From the beginning of 2017 to the end of June, credit increased by 3.3 per cent, while for the second half of the year, credit increased by 13.32 per cent. Credit growth mainly came from short-term loans worth VND46.67 trillion, a year-on-year increase of 37.32 per cent. Medium and long-term loans increased only 3.35 per cent to reach VND54.64 trillion.

Meanwhile, mobilised capital increased by 14.84 per cent to VND117.53 trillion. In particular, term deposits increased 15.6 per cent to VND110.43 trillion, accounting for 85.45 per cent of the total mobilised capital.

Operating expenses fell slightly by 2.18 per cent compared to 2016 with nearly VND2.21 trillion due to a staff drop of 3.03 per cent to some 6,021 employees. Eximbank did not open any new branches or transaction offices throughout 2017.

The ratio of non-performing loans (NPLs) dropped to 2.27 per cent from 2.95 per cent in 2016. NPLs balance also fell by VND261 billion to approximately VND2.3 trillion. — VNS