Intesa’s financial performance in the first three months of 2015 was very strong, with net profit of EUR 1.06bn - more than double the profit of Q1 2014 - highlighting the strong earning capacity potential of the bank, despite the difficult environment.

Indeed, while low and declining interest rates continue to pressure the net interest income, the strong performance of non interest income more than offset this pressure on NII, driving revenue growth of 16% compared to a year before. In particular, we highlight the good performance of fees (+15% YoY), and insurance revenues (+34% YoY).

Cost growth was contained at 1%, leading to a cost/income ratio of 44%, 7 percentage points lower than in Q1 2014 – although we caution that this ratio will be difficult to maintain for the full year in the absence of strong trading gains.

Loan loss provisions declined by 30%, reflecting lower, yet positive, net inflows into impaired loans in the quarter, while cash coverage improved slightly (to 47% from 46.8% in Q4 and 46.7% in Q1 2014). The fully loaded CET1 ratio stood at 13.2%.

Download updated issuer report on Intesa