Standard Chartered Plc may take an extra US$100 million hit from bad debts in Taiwan this year, but will post "very strong" revenue increases thanks to overall strength in the region and an acquisition in Korea, it said yesterday.
The London-based bank expects "double-digit" revenue growth in both consumer and business lending in most of its markets, the company said in a statement.
"We have strong, broad-based income growth," said chief executive officer Mervyn Davies in the statement. "We are investing for the future while maintaining our disciplined approach to expenses and risk."
On the downside, Standard Chartered reiterated its May warning and said it expected this year's bad debt charge for its Taiwan consumer banking business to be double last year's level when it was US$98 million.
The country's credit-card market "has proved challenging," Standard Chartered said. Most of the charge would be taken in the first half of this year, the bank said, adding that there were recent signs of improvement in credit quality in Taiwan.
Consumer bad-debt charges in the rest of the bank's consumer units are growing "in line" with asset growth, and the environment for business lending remains "benign," the bank said.
Standard Charter said this year's results will benefit from the inclusion of Korean SC First Bank. The unit, acquired in April last year for 3.4 trillion won (US$3.5 billion), posted an 82 percent rise in first quarter net income as it cut bad loan provisions and increased lending, Standard Chartered said in May.
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