SEOUL, Hana Financial Group Inc. on Wednesday reported its fourth-quarter net profit of 489.6 billion won (US$366.6 million), down 33.2 percent from a year earlier.
Operating income for the October-December period was 692.2 billion won, down 29.8 percent from a year ago, the company said in a regulatory filing. Revenue rose 195 percent to 14.27 trillion won.
The earnings failed to meet market expectations. The average estimate of net profit by analysts stood at 512.2 billion won, according to a survey by Yonhap Infomax, the financial data firm of Yonhap News Agency.
For the whole year, the group posted a net profit of 3.49 trillion won, down 3.88 percent from a year earlier.
Operating income came to 4.73 trillion won, up 1.03 percent on-year, with its annual sales slipping 0.79 percent to 69.7 trillion won.
The group attributed the on-year decline in net income to a sharp increase in reserves for future loss.
In the October-December period alone, the group set aside some 370 billion won in reserve fund
s, bringing its total reserve to 1.72 trillion won, up 41.1 percent from a year earlier.
The flagship Hana Bank posted a net profit of 3.47 trillion won in 2023, up 12.3 percent from a year earlier, with its noninterest income spiking over 116 percent on-year to 528.8 billion won. The noninterest income of the entire group jumped 65.3 percent on-year to 1.9 trillion won.
The bank’s net interest margin, or the difference between interest paid and interest received, came to 1.52 percent in the fourth quarter, down from 1.96 percent tallied in the fourth quarter of 2022.
Hana Securities swung to a net loss of 270.8 billion won last year from a net profit of 125.9 billion won in 2022.
Source: Yonhap News Agency