Hong Leong Finance full-year profit falls 10% on allowances for bad debt

Hong Leong Finance on Thursday reported a 10.4 per cent fall in full-year net profit, as it took an allowance for doubtful debts.

Net profit for the three months ended Dec 31, 2014 stood at S$62.8 million, compared to S$70.1 million a year ago.

It set aside a S$2.02 million allowance for doubtful debts for the year. This compared against a writeback of S$2.34 million a year ago.

"The decline in profit for 2014 when compared to 2013 is accentuated by the standard industry practice of immediately topping up general prudential provision when the loan book grew in 2014, ahead of the income generated from the increases in the loan portfolio," the company said in its financial statement.

Net interest income inched up 0.5 per cent from a year ago to S$149 million. Fee income, however, fell 20.9 per cent to S$12.3 million.