The cantonal bank of Baselland in 2019 increased its profit slightly with higher income from commissions and services. The transformation of the business has proved costly and weighed on the result.
Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank (BLKB) had a profit of 136.8 million Swiss francs ($139.2 million) in 2019, up 1.8 percent from a year earlier, according to a statement by the bank on Wednesday (release in German).
The increase was mainly due to growth in revenues from commissions, services and trading. Commissions and services contributed 67.6 million francs (plus 1.9 percent) to the bank’s revenues, while trading income added 3.5 percent to 17.4 million.
Increase in AuM
By contrast, BLKB struggled to grow in the core interest business, which added 0.1 percent to reach 267.3 million francs – the bank cited challenging conditions in the business as a reason for the relatively slow rate of growth.
Assets under management rose by 1.9 billion francs to 21.5 billion, with net new money of 687 million (compared with 524 million a year earlier).
Challenging Year 2020
Operating costs increased 2 percent to 171.7 million francs because of investments in the bank’s transformation. The cost-income ratio was 47.4 percent – up by 4 basis points.
The bank expects to post a slightly higher profit in 2020 than last year but expects challenging conditions to prevail this year. It will continue to diversify the business and boost income from services that are not affected by the rate of interest – for instance commission income.
