(LEAD) Hana Financial reports nearly 15-fold jump in Q4 net profit

(ATTN: RECASTS headline, lead; ADDS details in para 4-10)
SEOUL, Feb. 11 (Yonhap) -- Hana Financial Group Inc., South Korea's
fourth-largest financial conglomerate, said Thursday its net profit surged almost
15-fold in the fourth quarter from a year earlier, as it set aside less loan-loss
reserves while its loan profitability improved.

Net profit rose to 192.9 billion won (US$166.7 million) in the October-December
period, compared with 12.4 billion won in the fourth quarter of 2008, the company
said in a regulatory filing. The figure marks a growth of 1,452.9 percent.
Revenue, however, shrank 66.6 percent year-on-year to 6.1 trillion won, according
to the firm.
Hana Financial shares closed 2.92 percent lower to 31,700 won on the Seoul
bourse. The fourth-quarter results were revealed after the closing bell.
The sharp gain came as a result of an exceptionally lower base in 2008. In the
last three months of last year, local banks' earnings were battered due to
massive loan-loss provisions as a flood of bank loans went sour amid the global
economic rout.
The strong fourth-quarter net gains in 2009 were also attributable to solid
profits from lending activities, Hana Financial Group noted in a statement.
Net interest margin (NIM), a key gauge of the profitability of loans, stood at
2.13 percent in the fourth quarter, rising above the 2-percent mark for the first
time since the third quarter of 2008, the lender said. NIM figures are different
for interests paid out on deposits and those earned from lending.
Non-performing loans, or lending more than three months overdue and likely to be
defaulted, made up 1.05 percent of Hana Financial's total lending as of
end-December, down 0.51 percentage point from three months earlier, it said.
As of the end of 2009, the group's capital adequacy ratio under measures set by
the Bank for International Settlement was 15.11 percent.
For the whole of 2009, the group's accumulated net income came to 306.3 billion
won, down 36.6 percent.
Hana Bank, the broader group's key unit, posted 198 billion won in net profit in
the last three months of 2009, compared with 25.7 billion won registered a year
earlier, Hana Financial said.
The nearly eight-fold gain in net profit came as the lender set aside less
provisions to cover risky loans and other loss-making financial products,
according to the bank.
pbr@yna.co.kr
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