Net profit of Turkey's banking sector hits $2.5 bln in January-April

Turkey's banking sector posted a net profit of 20.7 billion Turkish liras ($2.52 billion) in the first four months of 2021, the country's banking watchdog said on June 3. 

The sector's net profit was up 5.33% on the Turkish lira basis, compared with 19.65 billion Turkish liras ($2.82 billion) in the same period last year, according to the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency's data.

Total assets of the sector rose 24.9% year-on-year to 6.52 trillion Turkish liras ($792.7 billion) as of the end of April, the report showed.

Loans, the biggest sub-category of assets, were 3.8 trillion Turkish liras ($461.98 billion), increasing 22.5% compared to the same period last year.

On the liabilities side, deposits held at lenders in Turkey - the largest liabilities item - totaled nearly 3.69 trillion Turkish liras ($448.5 billion), up some %23.6 year-on-year.

The US dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate was 8.19 at the end of April 2021 and 6.99 at the end of April 2020, according to the Central Bank data.

Pointing to lenders' minimum capital requirements, the banking sector's regulatory capital-to-risk-weighted-assets ratio - the higher the better - was 17.93% by the end of April, versus 18.74% at the end of April 2020.

The ratio of non-performing loans to total cash loans - the lower the better - was 3.74% in the same period, versus 4.64% a year ago.

A total of 52 state/private/foreign lenders - including deposit, participation, and development and investment banks - conducted banking activities in Turkey as of April.

The sector had 202,826 employees, serving through 11,181 branches both in Turkey and overseas.

Economy,