The first quarterly report of listed banks has been disclosed, and a lot of information is revealed in the data.
In the first quarter, the overall performance of the banking industry continued the growth trend of last year, but the growth rate of revenue and net profit both dropped, and the growth rate of net profit attributable to the parent company of listed banks dropped from 12.6% to 8.7%, especially among joint-stock banks.
Combining bank statements and analysts' opinions, the decline in profit growth is due to the subsidence of the low profit base effect caused by excessive impairment in the previous period, and the decline of wealth management business due to factors such as capital market fluctuations, dragging down intermediary business income. Growth slowed.
In terms of asset quality, the non-performing ratios of most banks continued to improve, but the real estate business was still the main drag, and banks were still strengthening risk prevention.
In addition, recently, the National Standing Committee proposed to appropriately reduce the provision coverage ratio of large banks with relatively high provision coverage ratios. At present, it has not been carried out on a large scale, but the Postal Savings Bank of China, which has the highest provisioning ratio, has already taken the lead; small and medium-sized banks have increased Provision is still the mainstream trend, and many small and medium-sized banks have made it clear that the provision coverage ratio will remain stable in the future, and there is no plan to reduce or increase it.
China's income growth slows down, what is the impact of capital market turmoil?
According to statistics from Orient Securities, in the first quarter, the overall operating income (excluding other business costs) of the 41 listed banks (excluding the newly listed Bank of Lanzhou) increased by about 4.4% year-on-year, compared with the 7.8% increase in the whole year of 2021. The growth rate of net profit attributable to the parent company dropped from 12.6% to 8.7%.
Specifically, among the 6 large state-owned banks, only Postal Savings Bank maintained double-digit growth in revenue and net profit attributable to the parent, 10.1% and 17.8% respectively; among joint-stock banks, only Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, Ping An Bank, Zhejiang The growth rate of commercial banks was better than that of last year, while the rest of the growth rates declined. In contrast, 6 small and medium-sized banks, especially rural commercial banks, still maintained a net profit growth rate of more than 20%. Among them, Shanghai Rural Commercial Bank and Jiangyin Commercial Bank The growth rate of banks, Wuxi Bank, and Changshu Bank continued to expand, driving the overall growth rate of rural commercial banks to expand from 15.7% to 17.9%. Eight of the city commercial banks grew by over 20%, but only Nanjing Bank and Hangzhou Bank expanded.
Tang Zipei, an analyst at Orient Securities Bank, believes that the decline in the bank's profit growth rate in the first quarter is mainly related to the subsidence of the low profit base effect caused by the excessive provision for impairment in the previous period.
In terms of revenue composition, due to factors such as the continued pressure on net interest margins and the weakening of credit demand due to the epidemic, 12 banks’ net interest income decreased year-on-year; while in the same period, due to the impact of capital market fluctuations, net fee and commission income The growth rate of the main intermediary business income also slowed down.
According to the statistics of the First Financial Reporter, 24 of the 42 listed banks' net income from fees and commissions fell compared with the fourth quarter of last year, and the year-on-year growth rate of 27 banks was lower than that of the whole year of last year.
(Data source: First Finance and Economics is based on the financial reports of listed banks)
Institutional people generally believe that the slowdown in intermediary business income is related to the volatility of the capital market since the beginning of this year. Many banks have mentioned this reason in their financial reports or performance briefings and investor surveys. Among them, wealth management businesses such as agency sales of funds and wealth management have been affected. obvious.
For example, due to factors such as the capital market and insurance policies, the scale of Minsheng Bank's agency fund business and agency single-payment insurance business declined, which in turn led to a year-on-year decrease of 947 million yuan in agency business revenue; Ping An Bank also stated that the bank's wealth management procedures in the first quarter Fee income (2.244 billion yuan, excluding agency personal precious metal business) decreased by 6.8% year-on-year, mainly due to the initiative to reduce the scale of non-standard products and the decline in fund sales caused by the volatility of the securities market; China Merchants Bank’s wealth management fees and Commission income (10.429 billion yuan) was also affected by the downturn in the capital market, down 11.11% year-on-year.
It is worth noting that banks such as Zhangjiagang Bank have stated in institutional surveys that since the beginning of this year, the "breaking tide" of wealth management products has caused customers to "regularize deposits" to a certain extent, which in turn has raised the cost of debt.
Although industry insiders generally told reporters that this indirect impact is limited.
However, it cannot be ignored that in recent years, the net interest margin of banks has continued to be under pressure. On the asset side, many banks have mentioned factors such as falling market interest rates and continuing to benefit the real economy. Yields have fallen.
According to statistics from the First Financial Reporter, in the first quarter of this year, 19 of the 39 listed banks with comparable data had a decline in their net interest margins.
In this context, reducing debt costs and expanding capital-light businesses have become the main ways to ensure profitability.
The relevant person in charge of Bank of Hangzhou said at the first quarter performance meeting that in the future, it will continue to promote the capital-light strategy and increase the proportion of non-interest income, such as increasing settlement and other fee income in the company's business, while expanding credit bond distribution, asset securitization, etc. Capital light business.
The provision coverage ratio has increased and decreased, and some major banks have lowered it
Under multiple pressures, what supports the growth of bank performance?
According to Tang Zipei's team's calculations, the scale growth brought about by the efforts of the credit policy and the continuation of the profit-feeding from provisioning have contributed 5.4 and 6.1 percentage points to the net profit growth of the banking industry respectively.
The repeated epidemic has brought certain pressure on credit issuance, especially consumer credit, but the impact is relatively limited. Especially with the continuous strengthening of counter-cyclical policies, the credit volume of many banks in the first quarter still hit a new high in the past three years.
From the perspective of credit investment, the "comprehensive strengthening of infrastructure construction" has already made efforts in some areas in advance.
For example, Hangzhou Bank mentioned in a survey summary that the bank's loans in Zhejiang Province increased by 22.3% in the first quarter, while infrastructure loans increased by 22.88 billion yuan, or 17.6%, compared with the beginning of the year.
Looking forward to the future, the relevant person in charge of Sunong Commercial Bank responded in the investor survey that at present, most enterprises in Suzhou have begun to put into normal production and operation, and the demand for funds of enterprises is gradually recovering.
The back-feeding effect of provisioning is mainly due to the impact of the epidemic and the banking industry's tradition of "replenishing apology with abundance".
Guosen Securities Bank analyst Wang Jian analyzed that after the non-performing asset cycle from 2012 to 2016, the asset quality of my country's banking industry has generally stabilized, but there is still a tradition of making substantial provisions in years with stable asset quality. form the "credit cost".
If this "credit cost" is finally "turned out of danger", it will be used as a profit to feed back the net profit.
However, with the recurrence of the epidemic, the urgency of the profit-making entity has been further strengthened.
On April 13, the National Standing Committee clearly encouraged large banks with higher provision levels to reduce their provision coverage ratios in an orderly manner.
It is generally believed in the industry that this move can improve the bank's ability to provide credit by releasing profits and speeding up non-performing disposal.
In particular, large banks with good asset quality and stable operations have already met the conditions to properly adjust the provision coverage ratio.
Judging from the first quarterly report, most banks still maintained the trend of increasing non-performing loan provisions.
According to the latest research report of Orient Securities, at the end of the first quarter of this year, the overall provision coverage ratio of listed banks was about 241%, an increase of 3.5 percentage points from the end of last year.
The reporter's statistics found that in the first quarter, only 10 of the 42 listed banks' provision coverage ratios were lower than that at the end of last year, and most of the declines were within 10 percentage points.
During the same period, the overall NPL ratio of the banking industry in the first quarter decreased by 1BP (basis point) from the end of last year to 1.33%, and 27 of the 42 listed banks had a NPL ratio decline in the first quarter. The NPL ratio of other banks remained the same as at the end of last year.
(Data source: First Finance and Economics is based on the financial reports of listed banks)
However, it can be seen that the Postal Savings Bank of China, which has the highest provision coverage ratio among the major state-owned banks, has already made some moves. The provision coverage ratio decreased by 5.03 percentage points from the end of last year to 413.58%.
"Now that there are enough provisions, it is actually possible to make less provisions. The coverage rate of those hundreds of provisions is a bit high." Wang Jian pointed out in a recent analysis article.
According to the data of the first quarterly report, the listed banks with the highest provision coverage ratio are mostly small and medium-sized banks, and the highest is the Bank of Hangzhou, which is as high as 580.09%.
Among the major state-owned banks, the Agricultural Bank and China Construction Bank are followed by the Postal Savings Bank. The latest provision coverage ratios of the two are 307.5% and 246.36% respectively; among the joint-stock banks, China Merchants Bank ranks first with 462.68%, Ping An Banks came in second with 289.10%.
However, the reporter noticed that in the first quarter, the provision coverage ratio of 7 small and medium-sized banks including Jiangyin Bank, Wuxi Bank, Suzhou Bank, and Chengdu Bank increased by more than 10 percentage points, and there are already Sunong Commercial Bank, Bank of Hangzhou, Bank of Ningbo, etc. Small and medium-sized banks stated that they would maintain a stable provision coverage ratio.
In response to questions from investors, the relevant person in charge of Bank of Ningbo said that the encouragement to reduce the provision coverage ratio is mainly to allow large banks to increase credit supply to the real economy such as small and medium-sized enterprises, and to expand the tolerance of non-performing loans, but considering that large banks The focus of SMEs is still on state-owned central enterprises, and the investment weight on SMEs is still relatively low. Therefore, the market share competition for SMEs in the banking industry will be more intense. At present, the bank does not reduce or increase the provision coverage ratio.
As early as during the epidemic in 2020, the National Standing Committee proposed to reduce the regulatory requirements for the provision coverage ratio of small and medium-sized banks by 20 percentage points in stages, and the regulatory standard to be reduced to between 100% and 130%.
Judging from the financial reports since then, fewer banks have lowered their provision coverage ratios.
The impact of the epidemic is limited, and the real estate business continues to drag down asset quality
From the perspective of asset quality, although the overall non-performing ratio of the banking industry continues to improve, there are also concerns about the future behind the provision for "making up apologies with abundance", especially under the risks of the real estate industry and macroeconomic pressure, some companies' tight capital chains and other factors have affected some companies. The asset quality of banks was dragged down.
Taking China Merchants Bank as an example, affected by the risk exposure of high-debt real estate companies and individual poorly managed corporate customers, the bank's NPL ratio in the first quarter increased by 0.03 percentage points from the end of last year to 0.94%, of which the ratio of non-performing loans to corporate real estate was higher than that at the end of the previous year. Up 1.18 percentage points to 2.57%.
In addition to the impact of the epidemic in some regions on the retail loan business, the balance and proportion of non-performing loans, special mention loans and overdue loans of the bank all increased compared with the end of the previous year.
During the same period, China Merchants Bank increased the credit loss provision for real estate risk customers, resulting in a year-on-year increase of 4.990 billion yuan in credit impairment losses on loans and advances, and finally the group's overall credit impairment losses (21.523 billion yuan) increased by 4.76% year-on-year.
In addition, the non-performing loan ratio in the real estate industry of Hangzhou Bank also increased by 0.99 percentage points over the previous year to 3.78%. The bank explained that under the principle of prudence, two operating property loans with normal principal and interest payments but affected by the epidemic were included in the non-performing loan management. .
In fact, under regulatory requirements such as the three red lines for real estate enterprises and the management of the concentration of loans in the real estate industry of banks, the banking industry has begun to reduce the real estate business in an orderly manner. As a result of this acceleration, many bank-related businesses were further compressed in the first quarter.
At the same time, various banks have continued to increase the risk prevention measures in the real estate industry. In addition to fully accruing provisions and strengthening the disposal of non-performing assets, the business also includes the implementation of the customer list system management of development loans, focusing on the central urban areas of first- and second-tier cities, and supporting and guaranteeing. In addition, we will increase the support for high-quality housing enterprises to acquire and acquire housing, and shift credit resources to personal loan mortgages (demand-based and improvement-based), etc.
In addition, many banks expressed that there is pressure on risk management for future asset quality.
The relevant person in charge of Bank of Nanjing said that the risks of uncertain factors such as repeated epidemics exist objectively but are generally controllable.
A number of banks said that they will actively respond to the bailout requirements of epidemic prevention and control, support for the resumption of work and production, and help the weak, and increase customer risk monitoring.