Kuwait Finance House Q4 Net Profit More Than Doubles

Kuwait Finance House (KFH) more than doubled its fourth-quarter net profit and executives at the Gulf state’s largest Islamic bank proposed a 13 per cent dividend distribution and 13 per cent bonus shares.

Net profit rose to 26.4 million Kuwaiti dinars ($94.7 million) in the three months to the end of December compared to 11.8 million dinars a year earlier, a calculation based on figures released on Monday showed.

Broker EFG Hermes had expected the bank to earn 29.9 million dinars in the quarter while HSBC saw its quarterly profit at 56 million dinars.

KFH said its loan book had improved in 2013 after allocating 187 million dinars in provisions. The share of non-performing assets fell to 4.4 per cent from 5.7 per cent, it said.

Full-year net profit rose 32 per cent to 115.9 million dinars while total assets were up 10 per cent to 16.1 billion dinars. Customer deposits were up eight per cent to 711 million dinars.

In 2012, the bank paid a 10 per cent cash dividend and issued 10 per cent bonus shares for shareholders.

KFH also said it was about to finalize marketing and selling plots of its flagship real estate project Diyar Al-Muharrq in Bahrain, describing it as the largest private sector housing project in the country.