National Bank reports swing to profits after Q3
Greece’s top lender National Bank reported on Wednesday a 262-million-euro group net profit for the first nine months of 2013, compared to 2.5-billion-euro losses in the same period last year.
“It is notable that these results were achieved despite the temporary difficulties that emerged in the Turkish market in the third quarter of 2013,” the bank’s chief executive officer Alexandros Tourkolias said in a statement.
The bank credited the profit on continued cost-cutting in Greece and southeastern Europe, which offset the rise in expenditure in the developing Turkish market.
NBG said that total assets for September 2013 stood at 111 billion euros, compared to 103.1 billion September last year, marking an 8-percent rise. Deposits saw a 17-percent increase, now standing at 65.0 billion euros compared to the previous 55.7 billion.
The lender had reported a net loss of 2.14 billion euros for all of 2012, while in 2011 it had lost over 12.3 billion euros. [AFP]
