Turkish banking sector profits $4.6B in Jan-April

By Jeyhun Aliyev

ANKARA (AA) - The Turkish banking sector posted an 18.8-billion-Turkish lira ($4.67 billion) net profit in the January-April period, according to the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency (BDDK) on Wednesday.

From January to April, the net profit of the sector recorded a 7.9 percent rise year-on-year, compared to the 17.5 billion Turkish liras ($4.94 billion) in net profit during the same period last year.

The banking watchdog said the total assets of Turkey's banking sector amounted to 3.44 trillion Turkish liras ($851.6 billion), with an annual increase of 18.9 percent, as of April 2018.

Loans given by banks -- the biggest sub-category of assets -- stood at around 2.24 trillion Turkish liras ($555.3 billion) at the end of April -- indicating a 20.6 percent hike on a yearly basis.

Deposits held at the country's banks amounted to 1.82 trillion Turkish liras ($452 billion) as of April, marking a yearly rise of 18.8 percent.

The banking sector's regulatory capital to risk weighted assets ratio -- a significant indicator to figure out minimum capital requirements of lenders -- was at 16.41 percent in April, up from 16.38 percent in April 2017.

According to the BDDK figures, the ratio of non-performing loans to total cash loans -- another crucial indicator that shows how healthy the banking sector is -- was 2.88 percent as of April this year, showing an improvement by falling from 3.19 percent in the same month of 2017.

In Turkey, nearly 50 state/private/foreign lenders, including deposit banks, participation banks, development and investment banks had more than 11,500 domestic and overseas branches with nearly 209,000 employees as of April.

Last year, the Turkish banking sector's net profit hit an all-time high, reaching around 49 billion Turkish liras ($13 billion) -- a yearly increase of 30.8 percent.