The profits of the U.S. banks continue to rise, but the trend is due largely to fewer resources allocated to cover potential losses announced by the federal Agency for Deposit Insurance. The banking sector gained 28.8 billion dollars in the second quarter of 2011, which is 7.9 billion dollars over the same period last year. The agency warned again that this increase in profit can not be supported simply by reducing the resources allocated against losses.
“Since the levels of reserves against losses approaching historic levels, the prospects for increasing profits thanks to lower reserves further decreased,” said acting chairman of the board of directors of the agency Martin Gryunbarg in his note. The revenues of banks continued to decline. In the second quarter operating income decreased by $ 3 billion or 1.8% compared to levels from the same period of 2010, by the agency. The positive signal for the sector is that part of the credit balance is increased for the first time in three years by 0.9% to 64.4 billion dollars.
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The Swiss bank UBS came first profit since Oswald Gryubel assumed leadership of the company a year ago. Net profit for the financial institution for the fourth quarter of 2009 amounted to 1.205 billion Swiss francs (1.1 billion), Reuters reported. This is a significant improvement compared to the same period in 2008 when the bank had a loss of 9.58 billion francs. The improvement is partly due to a tax credit of 480 million Swiss francs, and the reduction of bonuses. However, under pressure from the continuing effects of the global financial crisis led to tax evasion cases in the United States and pressure from other countries for violation of banking secrecy to disclosure of tax crimes, UBS continues to lose the trust of its customers. “We are sure that the measures we took for withdrawal of capital from the bank’s clients are effective, but in the immediate future we expect to continue to draw,” says Oswald Gryubel CEO and Chairman of the Board of Directors Vilidzhar Kasper in a letter to investors.
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