By Stuart Condie

SYDNEY--Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. said its annual net profit fell by 40% as it absorbed one-off items including impairment charges related to the impact of Covid-19.

Australia's fourth-largest lender by market capitalization on Thursday reported a statutory profit of 3.58 billion Australian dollars (US$2.52 billion) for the 12 months through September.

Cash earnings--a measure closely tracked by analysts that strips out non-core items such as revenue hedges and treasury shares--fell by 41% to A$3.66 billion. When measured only using continuing operations, ANZ's cash profit fell by 42% to A$3.76 billion.

"This decrease was primarily driven by full-year credit impairment charges of A$2.74 billion, which increased from prior year due to the impact of Covid-19 and a first half impairment of Asian associates of A$815 million, also related to the pandemic," ANZ said in a regulatory filing.

ANZ's result came two days after the lender surprised analysts by logging A$528 million in additional second-half items including customer remediation charges and accelerated software amortization.

The bank declared a final dividend of A$0.35 per share, compared with A$0.80 a year ago. Its full-year payout dropped to A$0.60 from A$1.60 in fiscal 2019, having paid a deferred interim dividend of 25 Australian cents on Sept. 30.

Write to Stuart Condie at stuart.condie@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

10-28-20 1704ET