Impairment charge tiny at ASB

ASB has become the first among the four major banks in New Zealand to slash the bad debt charge in its income statement.

In the September 2010 quarter, ASB had NZ$1 million in credit impairment expenses, compared with NZ$77 million in the same quarter the year before, and NZ$125 million in the year ended June 2010.

The credit impairment charges were mainly due to a NZ$20 million drop in collective provisions and a small recovery of bad debt. This was offset by an increase in individual provisions and a write-off of bad debts.

ASB also saw an improvement in asset quality in the last quarter, with 90-day past due loans dropping to NZ$352 million, from NZ$369 million, at the end of June, and total impaired assets falling to NZ$484 million, from NZ$492 million.

The drop in the bad debt charge was the main contributor to the sharp rise in pre-tax profit, to NZ$215 million, from NZ$120 million in September 2009 quarter.

Net profit after tax saw a rebound to profit, from a net loss last year, due mainly to a tax of NZ$244 million in the September 2009 quarter.

During the quarter, ASB saw a rise in both customer deposits and money market deposits, but the increased deposits did not translate into an increase in loans.

The loan book, in fact, saw a small shrinkage, to NZ$53.5 billion, over the quarter.

Customer deposits increased to NZ$31.7 billion, from NZ$31.5 billion, and money market deposits swelled to NZ$18.3 billion, from NZ$17.9 billion.