Turkish banking sector's net profit reaches $7B in Jan-Oct

By Tuba Sahin

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's banks posted a net profit of 66.1 billion Turkish liras ($7 billion) in January-October, according to the country's banking watchdog on Monday.

The 10-month figure rose from 50 billion Turkish liras ($6 billion) in the same period last year, the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency (BRSA) data showed.

The total assets of the banks surpassed 7.4 trillion Turkish liras ($774.1 billion) as of end-October, up from 6.2 trillion Turkish liras ($751.9 billion) in the same period last year.

Loans, the largest sub-category of assets, went up 12% to some 4.2 trillion Turkish liras ($439 billion) during the same period.

On the liabilities side, deposits held at lenders in Turkey reached 4.3 trillion liras ($455.6 billion) as of the end of the month, up 19% year-on-year.

Shedding light on lenders' minimum capital requirements, the banking sector's regulatory capital-to-risk-weighted-assets ratio -- the higher the better -- was 17.31% by the end of this October, down from 19.42% last October.

The ratio of non-performing loans to total cash loans – the lower the better – was 3.50% versus 3.97% in October 2020.

As of the end of September, a total of 53 state/private/foreign lenders – including deposit banks, participation banks, development and investment banks – were operating in Turkey.

The sector had 201,738 employees serving through 11,146 branches both in Turkey and abroad with 48,804 ATMs.