Aug 12 (Reuters) – Commonwealth Bank of Australia reported record full-year cash earnings on Wednesday, driven by robust home and business lending volumes and resilient credit quality.
The bank’s home lending volumes rose 5.8% and business lending gained 9.6% from a year earlier, despite intense competition.
The country’s biggest lender by market capitalisation and mortgage portfolio posted cash earnings of A$10.98 billion ($7.75 billion) for the year ended June 30, compared with A$10.25 billion reported last year.
That beat a Visible Alpha consensus estimate of A$10.85 billion.
However, CBA flagged signs of cooling housing loan demand, saying home loan application volumes had fallen 15% since May, including a 28% drop in investor applications.
The bank’s annual net interest margin, a key measure of profitability, fell 3 basis points from last year to 2.05%.
It declared a final dividend of A$2.70 per share, compared with A$2.60 a piece it paid last year.
($1 = 1.4166 Australian dollars)
(Reporting by Roshan Thomas in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)
