DBS Q4 net profit misses forecasts on bad debt charges

[SINGAPORE] DBS Group Holdings, Singapore's biggest bank, on Tuesday posted a 4.5 per cent rise in core fourth-quarter net profit and notched up record full-year earnings, but missed analysts' estimates due to higher bad debt provisions and lower trading income.

Bad debt provisions rose 40 percent to S$211 million, while trading income dropped 44 percent with the bank blaming less favourable trading conditions.

DBS said net profit for the October-December period came to S$838 million, below an average forecast of S$931 million from six analysts polled by Reuters.

That compares with a net profit before exceptional items of S$802 million in the same period a year earlier. In the previous year, the sale of a stake in a Philippine bank boosted overall net profit to S$973 million.

DBS' full-year net profit rose 10 percent to hit a record S$4.046 billion, the bank said.

REUTERS