Nova KBM, Slovenia's second largest banking group, which has been part of the Hungarian OTP group since last year, saw its net profit rise by 92% to €203.8 million last year.

The 2023 report released by the Maribor-based group shows its total net operating revenue increased by 28% on the year before to top €404 million, as operating profit before tax almost doubled to €206.6 million.

Net interest income almost doubled as well to €336.4 million due to a large difference between interest rates for cash deposits and loans. Net non-interest income meanwhile fell by about 40% to €67.9 million.

Total operating costs remained broadly flat at €155.4 million. The number of employees was reduced by 192 in a year to 1,575.

The group released net impairments and provisions for credit risks in the amount of €15.4 million last year, with the total assets rising from €10.41 billion in 2022 to €10.80 billion last year.

While total deposits from the non-banking sector decreased by 2% to €8.39 billion and total loans to the non-banking sector fell by 16% to almost €4.40 billion, the securities portfolio, especially bonds, and the volume of off-balance-sheet operations increased significantly, the bank said.

The parent bank posted a net profit of €189.3 million, up from €115.6 million in 2022.

Retail deposits there rose slightly to €6.13 billion, while deposits from companies and other legal entities fell by 8% to €2.26 billion. Total loans to the general public also increased slightly to €2.05 billion, while the value of loans to companies dropped by around a quarter to €2.33 billion.

Both the Nova KBM group and the bank were profitable last year. The return on equity after tax for the 2023 financial year reached 19.79% at group level and 18.39% at the core bank.

Nova KBM became the 11th member of OTP group at the beginning of 2023, and has since then been intensively preparing for the merger with SKB Bank, which is expected to be carried out this year.

SKB generated €76.5 million in net profit last year, a 25% increase on the year before that is largely a result of high interest revenue due to a favourable trend in market interest rates.

Operating profit of the SKB group was up by 23.5% to €93.4 million. The costs related to the merger with the NKBM bank excluded, the growth was 38.5%.

The SKB group, which in addition to the core bank consists of SKB Leasing and SKB Leasing Select and employs almost 1,000 people, generated €182 million in net revenue, up 38.5%.