Top China bank ICBC posts 4% rise in profit

SINGAPORE/BEIJING: Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), the world’s biggest commercial lender by assets, posted a 4.1% rise in profit for the three months ended March, its fastest growth for the period since 2014.

Profit was 82 billion yuan ($12.2 billion) for the first quarter, compared with nearly 79 billion yuan in the same period a year earlier, the bank said in a filing on Monday. That compared with an average projection for a 4.3% growth, two brokerage estimates compiled by Reuters show. The results from China’s biggest commercial lender indicate early signs of profit and asset-quality recovery amid optimism the world’s No.2 economy may be starting to stabilise.