ANZ hit many financial targets and provided a robust defence of the progress of its strategy in Asia in its annual profit announcement, which was released yesterday.It is a result that defies the legacy of the great recession, by extracting revenue and profit growth in Asia, and highlights the financial flexibility of a bank tackling a more complex strategy than any of its peers.ANZ did not bother to label its statutory net profit, of A$6.3 billion, for the year to September 2003 as a record. It saved that sobriquet for the cash profit, of $6.5 billion, a rise of 11 per cent on 2012.The return on equity, using the statutory profit, was 14.9 per cent for the full year and 15.3 per cent for the second half. These measures were increases of 30 and 90 basis points, respectively, but still no record, with ANZ's returns being right on the industry average.The bank now aims to lift ROE to "at least 16 per cent by the end of the 2016 financial year", it said yesterday.There are some stark claims in the ANZ result, such as "an 18 per cent increase in productivity by reducing operating expenses by 10 per cent."Like its peers, ANZ is also enjoying the fruits of the improvement in credit quality since the GFC peak in bad debts more than three years.