Citigroup Inc. he said Friday that his fourth-quarter revenue fell 7% and that he withdrew some of the reserves he had set aside to cover potentially sour loans.
The New York Bank said profits fell to $ 4.63 billion, or $ 2.08 per share, compared to $ 4.988 billion or $ 2.15 per share, a year earlier. That still exceeds the $ 1.34 expected by analysts surveyed by FactSet.
Revenue fell 10% to $ 16.5 billion, below the $ 16.722 billion analysts had expected.
Throughout 2020 – a year of economic turmoil – profits in the country’s third-largest bank by assets fell 41% to $ 11.377 billion, and revenue was $ 74.3 billion. Like its large banks, Citigroup enjoyed strong results from its Wall Street operations, but this was offset by the billions of dollars it had to set aside for potentially bad loans.
As a sign that its outlook for the economy has improved, Citigroup withdrew $ 1.5 billion from reserves it had set aside for future loan losses, one of the main reasons the bank’s profit was better than was expected.