OREANDA-NEWS. Sberbank (hereafter ”the Group”) has released its interim condensed consolidated IFRS financial statements (hereafter “the Financial Statements”) as at and for the 6 months ended 30 June 2016, with review report by AO PricewaterhouseCoopers Audit.

Herman Gref, President, Chairman of the Executive Board commented: “Despite still declining Russian GDP dynamics in the first half of 2016 we have seen some signs of stabilization, such as the oil prices rising and the Ruble strengthening, resulting in expectations of returning to positive GDP growth forecasted for the second half of 2016.

Against this backdrop I am happy to report our results for the first half year of 2016 with a net profit of RUB 263.1 billion driven by increasing Net Interest Income, steadily growing Fee & Commission income and an improving picture concerning Cost of Risk.

We continue to emphasize cost control and we were able to report an over 7% improvement on our cost-to-income ratio year on year from 44.8% to 37.7%.

Credit growth in Russia has slowed down from previous years and we don’t see this accelerating in the current environment of decreasing inflation and high rates. However, with the combination of slow growth and improved profitability, our Tier 1 capital has risen to 10.4% from 8.9% in the first half of 2016.

We continue to drive further digitalization of financial services and believe these efforts will allow us to strengthen our leading market position. Today we have 33 million active online customers, over 90% of retail and 99% corporate payments are executed remotely and product sales through remote channels are showing triple digit growth year on year.

Our operating environment outside of our core market Russia has been very eventful during this year. We continue to optimize our European network and in July we announced the finalization of the sale of our subsidiary bank in Slovakia. Our Turkish subsidiary is showing improving results in 1H2016 despite uncertainties affecting the region’s economies.

Looking ahead we see the stabilization continuing which will allow us to keep our Cost of Risk under control and together with improving efficiency, to maintain strong profitability for the full year 2016 and beyond.”

The 2Q 2016 Financial Highlights:

·         The Group net profit reached RUB145.4 bn, or RUB6.62 per ordinary share, up by 166.3% compared to 2Q 2015

·         The Group quarterly annualized return on equity (ROE) reached 22.8%, up from 10.3% in 2Q 2015

·         The quarterly Cost of Risk (CoR) came at 202 bp, compared to 260 bp for 2Q 2015

·         The Group Cost-to-Income ratio improved to 38.5% from 43.6% in 2Q 2015

·         The level of non-performing loans (NPLs) of total loan portfolio came down to 4.9% from 5.2% a quarter ago, while coverage level of NPLs improved to 134% from 121% during the quarter

·         The Group capital position improved during the quarter, with core capital adequacy ratio up by 70 basis points to 10.4%, while total capital adequacy ratio reached 14.1%, up by 70 basis points during the quarter

Net interest income reached RUB339.3 bn in 2Q 2016, up by 49.4% from the year-ago period:
  • Interest income (up 10.1% to RUB599.5 bn compared to 2Q 2015) growth was driven primarily by growth in mortgages and securities portfolio;
  • Interest expenses including deposit insurance expenses decreased by 18.0% from 2Q 2015 to RUB260.2 bn. The cost of liabilities decreased by 30 basis points to 4.7% in 2Q 2016 relative to 1Q 2016, driven by both corporate and retail term deposits, cost of which came down by 20 basis points to 4.3% and by 50 basis points to 6.0% respectively.

The Group’s 2Q 2016 net fee and commission income came at RUB85.9 bn, up by 18.5% from the year-ago period.

  • The fee and commission income grew by 21.0% to RUB104.7 bn from the year-ago period. Income from the banking cards operations increased by 15.8% in 2Q 2016 from 2Q 2015;
  • The fee and commission expense grew by 34.3% to RUB18.8 bn in part from expansion of banking cards business.

Net provision charge for loan impairment for 2Q 2016 totaled RUB98.3 bn compared to RUB117.5 bn for 2Q 2015. This translated into the cost of risk of 202 basis points for the quarter versus 260 basis points a year ago.

  • The cost of risk for corporate loans amounted to 233 basis points in 2Q 2016;
  • The cost of risk for retail loans decreased to 111 basis points in 2Q 2016.

Other non-interest income in 2Q 2016 came in at RUB17.6 bn primarily driven by sale of a non-core asset.

The Group's operating expenses for 2Q 2016 increased to RUB 168.8 bn, up by 15.1% from the same period a year ago mainly from the announced indexation of salaries.

Effective tax rate in 2Q 2016 reached 18.1%, down from 21.5% in 1Q 2016.