Corrections & Amplifications
This headline was corrected at 0539 GMT because the net profit was misstated as EUR1.38B.
Societe Generale SA said Wednesday that its fourth-quarter profit beat expectations on strong revenue after resilient performances in its international investment-banking and retail operations.
The French lender reported quarterly net profit of 1.16 billion euros ($1.24 billion), down from EUR1.79 billion a year earlier.
Net banking income, its top-line figure, rose 4.0% to EUR6.89 billion.
The figures beat expectations of net profit of EUR856 million and revenue of EUR6.42 billion, according to consensus estimates provided by FactSet.
The Paris-based bank, France’s third-largest by market capitalization, said the result was driven by strong performances in its financing & advisory, global markets and leasing subsidiary ALD, as well as growth at its private banking and international retail banking operations.
The bank’s global banking and international-retail businesses were particularly helped by higher interest rates in the period, it said.
SocGen declared a cash dividend of EUR1.70 and said it would launch a EUR440 million share-buyback program.
The bank said 2023 would be a transition year with decreased revenues, with the negative impacts related to the end of the tiering benefits and to the specific functioning of the French retail-banking market, in which there are caps on how much banks can take in from mortgage-rate rises.
Write to Ed Frankl at edward.frankl@dowjones.com
