(Reuters) -Australia’s Westpac Banking posted a 13% rise in its first-quarter net profit on Monday, helped by growth in customer deposits and housing and business loan volumes.
The country’s No. 3 lender by market value said unaudited net profit was A$1.7 billion ($1.08 billion) for the three months ended December 31, compared with A$1.5 billion posted a year earlier.
The bank’s core net interest margin – the difference between interest earned from lending and paid for deposits – fell 2 basis points from the second half of last year to 1.81%.
“The modest decline reflects prudent management in the context of ongoing mortgage competition and further deposit mix shift towards lower spread savings and term deposits,” Westpac said in a statement.
($1 = 1.5748 Australian dollars)
(Reporting by Himanshi Akhand and Rajasik Mukherjee in BengaluruEditing by Marguerita Choy and Leslie Adler)
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