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UnionBank will focus on consumer and corporate lending
to get back on track and recover a 63-percent drop in
net income for the first quarter the year.
In a
press briefing, bank president and chief operating
officer Victor Valdepeñas said the bank expects growth
from consumer and corporate lending, particularly in the
infrastructure and utility sectors.
“We
expect growth from lending. We also see increase in
corporate lending because of the build-up of activities
in the infrastructure and utility sectors,” he said.
The bank
is targeting a 5-percent to 10-percent growth this year,
or at least P3 billion from P2.9 billion in 2007. It
plans to generate half that target from its loan
portfolio.
UnionBank posted a P602.49-million net income for the
first quarter, down 63 percent from P1.63 billion posted
a year earlier.
The bank
posted a net income of P2.9 billion in 2007, 15.54
percent higher than theP2.51 billion it earned the year
before.
Valdepeñas said growth this year is slower than last
year’s because of skyrocketing oil prices and soaring
inflation.
He said
interest rates might move up again, increasing lending
rates and causing businesses to slow down.
“We have
factored these things [into] our projection, [but] we
still remain cautious and watchful of developments in
inflation and the economy in general,” he said.
Inflation hit a three-year high of 8.3 percent in April,
fueled by higher costs of food and fuel. The rate was at
the upper band of the government’s full-year inflation
target of 3 percent to 5 percent.
The bank
expects the peso to settle between P43 and P45 per
dollar this year, compared with earlier forecasts of P38
to P39 as traders become “more cautious.”
UnionBank, however, sees an “opportunity for growth” in
consumer lending because of improving lending margins,
which widened to 4.5 percent in the first quarter of the
year from 4 percent a year earlier on reduced funding
costs.
With
assets of P188.5 billion in 2007, UnionBank is the
country’s sixth-largest bank. It has 168 branches and
187 automated teller machines nationwide.
The bank
closed 2007 with an asset base of P187.99 billion from
P183.19 billion a year earlier. Loan portfolio stood at
P44.01 billion while deposits stood at P106.76 billion.
Its capital base rose 32.46 percent to P26.36 billion
from P19.90 billion, on internal capital generation and
proceeds from the follow-on equity offering in the first
half of the year. Its capital adequacy ratio stood at
16.44 percent. |
