BNP Paribas SA, France's largest bank, reported a 21 percent drop in first-quarter profit after ``violent'' market conditions led to asset writedowns and increased provisions for risky loans. Net income fell to 1.98 billion euros ($3.06 billion) from 2.51 billion euros a year earlier, the Paris-based bank said in an e-mailed statement today. Profit beat the 1.62 billion-euro median estimate of 11 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News. Sales fell 10 percent to 7.4 billion euros, matching estimates. ``The impact on our capital markets activity of the very I would say violent crisis of especially March has hit the numbers,'' Chief Executive Officer Baudouin Prot said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. [...] ING Groep NV, the biggest Dutch financial-services company, said first-quarter profit dropped 19 percent on declines in wholesale and online banking. Net income dropped to 1.54 billion euros ($2.4 billion) in the first three months of the year from 1.89 billion euros a year earlier, the Amsterdam-based company said today in an e-mailed statement. That was in line with the 1.56 billion-euro median estimate of 11 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. ING, which traces its roots to 1743 and operates in more than 50 countries, said profit fell 14 percent in the wholesale unit and 6.1 percent in online banking. The collapse of the U.S. subprime-mortgage market has sparked stock- and bond-market declines and $321 billion of writedowns and credit losses at the world's largest financial institutions. [...] Deutsche Post AG, Europe's biggest mail carrier, said first-quarter profit fell 18 percent after the Deutsche Postbank AG division reported a drop in earnings and an early Easter break held back growth. Net income declined to 407 million euros ($629 million), or 34 cents a share, from 499 million euros, or 41 cents, a year earlier, the Bonn-based company said in a statement today. Sixteen analysts surveyed by Bloomberg had expected 419 million euros. Sales advanced 1.8 percent to 15.7 billion euros. Chief Executive Officer Frank Appel is faced with turning around the DHL Express unit's unprofitable U.S. operations and must decide whether to sell a majority holding in Postbank, Germany's biggest consumer bank by clients. Postbank reported a 19 percent drop in first-quarter profit this month because of writedowns related to the U.S. subprime-mortgage market collapse. ``Given the working day effect and the faltering U.S. economy, business was very satisfactory in the first quarter,'' Chief Financial Officer John Allan said in the statement. http://www.bloomberg.com/index.html?Intro=intro3 Hum, 20 % is "correction" or a bear market "downturn" by definition?
Every single piece of negative news has been spun positive over the past two months. I don't see this as being any different. Media: Oh well... it was expected, write downs are almost over.
Do you guys have a recommendation for non US earnings previews/ forecast? I like using the basic US version of Yahoo. Unfortunately their European figures are not very detailed. Do they even have Quarterly Estimates over there? I do have Bloomberg available, but have not been very successful at finding anything relevant. Thanks in advance for any of your thoughts.