UCPB posts 34% profit growth in Q1

MANILA, Philippines - The United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB) has reported a 34-percent increase in net income to P883.7 million for the first quarter of 2012.

UCPB president and chief executive officer Jeronimo Kilayko attributed the increase to the bank’s ability to take advantage of the volatile fixed income market.

“The bank took advantage of the volatile fixed income market thus expanding its trading gains by more than three hundred folds during the first three months of the year to P486.9 million from P111.2 million in the same period last year,” Kilayko said.

He further explained that despite the normally weak banking activities in the first three months of a given year, UCPB surmounted this by taking advantage of all opportunities.

“Businesses normally slows down during this period but we still managed to sustain our growth in 2012. Our strong first quarter performance bodes well for the future of the bank,” he said, refusing to make a new forecast regarding the bank’s income prospects.

Kilayko said that UCPB would remain focused on its original full year 2012 target of P3.5 to P4 billion in net income.

Net income in 2011 amounted to P3.05 billion and P2.45 billion in 2010.

Meanwhile, interest income from loans rose 15 percent as the bank expanded its loan portfolio to P73.6 million by end of March 2012 from P62.1 as of March 2011.

Consumer loans, mainly the mortgage loans, rose at a faster rate primarily due to the bank’s tie-ups with major real estate developers. This provided bank access to more clients who would like to borrow to build their dream house.

On the other hand, funding for these loans came from the low cost checking accounts, savings accounts (CA/SA), which amounted to P102.2 million end March this year from P98 million in the same period in 2011.

CASA comprised 63 percent of the total deposits which rose by nine percent to P162 million in the first quarter versus P148 million the previous year.

Total assets stood at P204 million, up 13 percent while total capital increased by 23 percent to P17.9 million.