Laurentian Bank Reports Third-Quarter Profit
Montreal’s Laurentian Bank has reported a third-quarter profit of $40.1 million, up from a year ago.
The Quebec-based bank earned $1.27 per diluted share, up from $27 million—or 86 cents per diluted share—for the same quarter of 2013.
Excluding one-time items, the bank had an adjusted profit of $42.4 million, or $1.35 diluted per share, compared with $38.5 million, or $1.27 per share, in the same quarter last year.
Analysts had predicted adjusted earnings per share to be $1.40.
Total revenue decreased slightly, to $219.6 million from $221 million year-over-year.
Laurentian’s personal and commercial banking arm earned $30 million for the quarter, up from $26.1 million this time last year.
The bank said its commercial loan portfolio grew by 16 percent year-over-year and commercial mortgages grew by nine percent, excluding the sale of $102 million of commercial mortgage loans in the second quarter of this year.
As for the bank’s retail side, Laurentian said that it is putting more emphasis on wealth management and income from mutual fund sales increased by 29 percent in the third quarter compared with a year earlier.
Elsewhere, Laurentian’s B2B Bank subsidiary earned $13 million for the quarter, up from $5.2 million a year ago. Laurentian Bank Securities and Capital Markets earned $3 million in the quarter, compared with $2.3 million in the same quarter last year.
The bank's provision for loan losses increased by $1.5 million to $10.5 million in the third quarter of 2014, up from $9 million in the third quarter of last year.
Return on equity was 11.2 percent in the quarter versus 8.1 percent year-over-year.
