Turkey: Banking sector posts $5.65B net profit in Jan-Aug

ANKARA

Turkey's banking sector net profit totaled 32.8 billion Turkish liras ($5.65 billion) in January-August this year, the country's banking watchdog reported on Monday.

Total assets of the sector dropped 4.88% year-on-year to 4.27 trillion Turkish liras ($736 billion), according to the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency.

Loans -- the biggest sub-category of assets -- went down 6.13% on a yearly basis to amount to some 2.53 trillion Turkish liras ($437 billion).

On the liabilities side, deposits held at lenders in Turkey were 2.35 trillion Turkish liras ($406 billion) in the eight-month period, marking an annual hike of 5.74%.

The U.S. dollar/Turkish lira (USD/TRY) exchange rate was around 5.81 at the end of August this year, versus 6.42 at the end of the same month in 2018.

The banking sector's regulatory capital-to-risk-weighted-assets ratio -- the higher the better -- was 17.93% in August, compared with 17.34% in the same month last year.

Measuring the health of loans, the ratio of non-performing loans to total cash loans -- the lower the better -- was 4.64% in August, versus 2.85% a year ago.

A total of 51 state/private/foreign lenders -- including deposit banks, participation banks, and development and investment banks -- conducted banking activities in Turkey as of August.

The sector had over 205,000 employees, doing business at nearly 11,500 branches both in Turkey and abroad with more than 48,500 ATMs.

Last year, the Turkish banking sector's net profit totaled 53.5 billion Turkish liras ($10.6 billion) -- up 10% annually.