Jakarta. Despite a 7 percent surge in credit disbursement, Bank BTPN witnessed a double-digit decline in net profit for the year 2023.

BTPN recorded a net profit of Rp 2.36 trillion ($150.9 million) in late 2023, showing a 24 percent year-on-year decline. The drop was attributed to the bank's decision to raise credit reserves by Rp 1.21 trillion, ahead of the conclusion of the Financial Services Authority's (OJK) credit restructuring relaxation on March 31.

Meanwhile, BTPN's net interest income grew by 3 percent to Rp 12.04 trillion from the previous year's Rp 11.68 trillion. This increase in net interest income helped maintain the net interest margin (NIM) at 6.45 percent, surpassing the previous year's figure of 6.32 percent.

The increase in net interest income drove a 3 percent annual increase in BTPN's operational income, resulting in the growth of pre-provision operating profit to Rp 6.5 trillion from Rp 6.5 trillion.

"The support of our customers is the main factor behind the success in 2023," Henoch Munandar, CEO of BTPN, said on Monday.

Last year, BTPN recorded a 7 percent increase in total credit disbursement, reaching Rp 156.56 trillion from Rp 146.12 trillion at the end of 2022. This credit expansion was mainly driven by loan disbursements to corporate customers, small and medium enterprises (SMEs), and Jenius.

SME loan ratio increased to 29.14 percent by the end of December 2023 from 24.57 percent in the same period the previous year.

Bank BTPN also managed to decrease the gross non-performing loan (NPL) ratio to 1.36 percent at the end of 2023 from 1.43 percent in the same period the previous year. This ratio is lower than the industry average of 2.2 percent recorded at the end of December 2023.

The current account & savings account (CASA) balance of Bank BTPN increased by 10 percent from Rp 40.16 trillion to Rp 44.19 trillion at the end of 2023. The CASA ratio also experienced an improvement from 35 percent to 40.8 percent. Meanwhile, BTPN's total third-party funds decreased by 6 percent from Rp 114.87 trillion at the end of December 2022 to Rp 108.20 trillion at the end of December 2023. 

"This decline is associated with Bank BTPN's efforts to optimize funding costs," Henoch said.

In 2023, BTPN's app, Jenius, recorded a 19 percent growth in the number of registered users, reaching 5.2 million from 4.4 million in the previous year. The total loan disbursement increased by 121 percent to Rp 2 trillion from the previous year.