It's just about the reporting season for earnings for the June 2004 half, at least for listed companies; and this newsletter's still working over company financial statements for the December2003 full year for unlisted, but still important banking-related entities. Blame ASIC and blame the companies for that: reporting entities don't have to file financial statements until four months after the end of the financial year; they often file later, and then ASIC takes weeks in many cases to make these important disclosures available for scrutiny.Capital FinanceCapital Finance, the finance company arm of the HBOS group in Australia, recorded a sharp increase in profit in2003; and earned a return on assets more than one third higher than that recorded by BankWest's business banking arm in the last year.In an indication of the divergent returns between HBOS' conventional banking business and finance company, the latter is earning some of the best returns of any lender that falls into the "finance company" classification.• Pre-tax profit increased by 60 percent to $92.2 million in the year to December 2003, from $57.7 million in 2002.• Net profit increased one third to$63.5 million in 2003 from $47.1 million in 2002.• Loans and advances increased by a quarter to $5.1 billion from $4.1 billion.• The charge for bad debts fell to$17.1 million from $12.1 million.• However, impaired loans rose to$41.3 million from $33.4 million, in line with the growth in the book.• Capital's return on equity (measured on after tax profit) increased to 22 per cent (according to the company's commentary in the financial statements), or 24 per cent (based on average net assets).• Return on assets increased to 1.2per cent in 2003 (based on after tax profit) from 1.1 per cent in 2002.• But using a pre-tax return on assets, to enable a comparison with the reported segment profit for BankWest, Capital recorded an RoA of 1.8 per cent in 2003.• BankWest's "business solutions" segment, by comparison, recorded an RoA of 1.13 per cent in 2003.On a segment basis, the pre-tax profit for Capital's:• Motor segment (including loans to individuals) increased to $19.5 million in 2003 from $9.8 million in 2002.• The business segment, described in the accounts as business finance and aviation finance, increased to $16.6million from $13.0 million.• And the profit from the property segment increased to $56.1 million from $34.7 million. This is line with the concentration of Capital's business, with 39 per cent of loans related to construction and property.Capital is notionally the fourth-largest finance company in Australia, if the concept of an independent finance company makes much sense when operating under the umbrella of banking giant such as HBOS. It is clearly, though, the most profitable of any significant finance company in the country.Ford and BMW stallOf the tied finance companies in the motor vehicle sector that report in the year to December 2003, both Ford Credit and BMW Australia Finance reported results that point to a loss of momentum in either their financing or underlying business.Accounting changes drove most of