Moneta Money Bank reported a 3.7% drop in net profit to 3.97 billion crowns for the first three quarters of this year, while operating revenues remained almost unchanged at 9.1 billion. The result exceeded the expectations of the bank itself, which at the same time raised the outlook for the full-year result – it expects the profit to exceed five billion crowns. In the previous forecast published by the bank in July, Moneta expected a profit of “at least” 4.7 billion crowns this year.
Moneta was the first of the larger domestic banks to publish results. Next week, Česká spořitelna (on Monday, October 30) and Komerční banka (on Friday, November 3) will release figures on their performance. As the last of the “big three”, ČSOB will announce its results on Thursday, November 9.
Moneta ranks sixth in the domestic banking sector with its balance sheet amount, which increased by a fifth year-on-year to 449 billion crowns. It ranks similarly according to the number of clients, which rose by 154,000 to 1.6 million year-on-year.
This increase was also reflected in the balance of client deposits, which in the first nine months of the year rose by 22.7% year-on-year to 393 billion crowns, and were thus one of the decisive factors behind the increase in the overall balance. Moneta is also one of the main stocks on the Prague Stock Exchange, where it ranked fifth at the end of September with a market capitalization of 42.8 billion crowns. For comparison: for the largest traded company, the state-controlled enterprise ČEZ, it was 527.2 billion crowns on the same date.
Moneta’s shareholders, led by the PPF financial group, can enjoy the title’s growth this year, which has added more than 13% since the start of the year, slightly outperforming the overall local market, whose main index PX is up just under 12% so far.
Moneta CEO Tomáš Spurný told Reuters that the bank is in a “very good position to distribute profits to shareholders next year”, given the volume of excess capital and 3.2 billion crowns accumulated for future dividend payments.
Net interest income, or the main driver of Moneta’s results, fell by 11.3% year-on-year to 6.4 billion crowns, “due to the persistent pressure of financing costs”, the bank said in a comment on the results. On the other hand, total operating costs remained at 4.2 billion crowns.
The CNB is expected to bend the market
The banking sector is struggling with the weaker dynamics of new loans, reflecting the slowdown in demand and the prudence of providers. In the case of Moneta, mortgages fell mainly, where the volume of newly granted ones fell by 70.1% year-on-year, which corresponds to the overall development in this segment. Consumer loans decreased by 16% at Moneta, loans to companies fell by 26.8%.
Czech banks are in for a change in the environment in the coming months, as the Czech National Bank has repeatedly indicated that the moment is approaching when it will start reducing its main interest rate, which it has held at 7.00% since last June.
The CNB will meet again on the setting of monetary policy on November 2, when the central bank will also publish a quarterly update of its macroeconomic forecast. Considering the latest statements of the bank board members and investor positions in the market, a rate cut already next week seems possible, although so far rather unlikely.
The six largest domestic banks, which include Moneta, reported a drop in aggregate net profit to 37.1 billion crowns from 39.6 billion crowns in the same period last year for the first half of the year, mainly due to a drop in net interest income.
Bank assets, on the other hand, rose by 1.1 trillion crowns to 9.98 trillion crowns at the end of June compared to the end of 2022.
