Baltic, Banks, Financial Services, Investments

Of the 4.9 million euro profit, the bank's profit made up 3.4 million euros, while the asset management's profit amounted to 1.6 million euros and the Lithuanian business unit Mokilizingas earned 200,000 euros, the company told the stock exchange. The company's return on equity was 16.4% in the second quarter.

The group's consolidated loan portfolio grew by 11% to 606 million euros. Consolidated deposits grew by 26% to 1.01 billion euros. The volume of funds managed by LHV in the second quarter rose 1% to 1.04 billion euros. The loan write-down expenditure in the first quarter was 1.8 million euros, having been impacted by the discount of two clients in the sum of 1.4 million euros.

LHV Group posted a consolidated profit of 9.9 million euros for the first six months of 2017. The bank earned a profit of 7.6 million euros, asset management 2.3 million euros and the Lithuanian business unit 500,000 euros. The overall profit earned in the first six months of 2017 was 1.6 million euros higher than the year before.

The number of the bank's customers grew by approximately 5,000 in the second quarter and of the loans, loans to businesses increased the most, CEO of LHV Group Madis Toomsalu said. He added that of the deposits, there was an increase in the deposits of non-residents.

"In the second half of the quarter the bank submitted documents to the Financial Supervision Authority, which are required to open a branch in the United Kingdom, made an agreement on the site of the office in London and joined UK Finance. Developments regarding the U.K. have been as expected," Toomsalu said.

In order to sustain growth that exceeds the financial plan, the bank plans to increase their capital by 3 million euros in July, involving the respective sum from LHV Group, Toomsalu said. "This is the group's internal transaction and does not impact the group's own resources."

"LHV's pension funds continued investments related to Estonia. In the first six months as a whole, pension funds have already made investment decisions related to Estonia in the amount of 100 million euros. As the prices of internationally traded securities are high and the trading volumes of the Tallinn stock exchange are modest, we have started to develop the local capital market ourselves, looking for new investment opportunities. The objective of LHV's pension funds is to help the local enterprises grow, while we hope to earn a profit for the clients of our pension funds from this growth," Toomsalu said.

"LHV's outlook for the current year is good. We are aiming for growth in all our business directions. LHV's strong basic trends are also supported by the Estonian economic situation, which, according to the latest figures, is improving," Toomsalu said.