China's AgBank posts 5.5% H1 profit rise

SHANGHAI (Reuters) -Agricultural Bank of China Ltd (AgBank), the country's third-largest commercial lender by assets, said net profit grew 5.5% year-on-year in the first half of 2022. Profit was 128.9 billion yuan ($18.63 billion) in the six months through to June, compared with 122.3 billion yuan in the same period a year earlier, the bank said in a filing on Monday.

The data implies a second quarter net profit of 58.2 billion yuan, up 3% from a year earlier, Reuters calculations show.

The bank said its net interest margin - a key indicator of bank profitability - was 2.02% at the end of June, compared with 2.09% at the end of March.

It reported a 1.41% non-performing loan ratio at the end of the second quarter, holding steady from the end of the previous quarter.

($1 = 6.9206 Chinese yuan renminbi)

(Reporting by Ziyi Tang and Engen Tham; Editing by John Stonestreet and Bradley Perrett)

By Ziyi Tang and Engen Tham