Dutch lender ING beats view with near 27 pct rise in Q2 net earnings

The largest Dutch financial services company, reported on Wednesday a nearly 27 percent rise in net earnings for the second quarter due to strong lending growth, beating market expectations.

ING said in a statement that its underlying net earnings came in at 1.4 billion euros ($1.57 billion), with its banking operations helped by an improved performance in the financial markets business.

Analysts polled for Reuters had expected an average underlying net result of 1.06 billion euros, or a drop of around 5 percent.

ING gave no outlook, but Chief Executive Officer Ralph Hamers said “operational conditions remain difficult, with the economic shock of a Brexit vote (and) low interest rates”.

“Our core lending book grew by 14.8 billion euros during the second quarter of 2016, with growth well diversified across geographies and industry sectors,” ING said.

The company’s fully-loaded common equity Tier 1 ratio (CET1) rose to 13.1 percent, excluding 2.55 billion euros in net profit from the first half of 2016.