Cash profit of ANZ falls to 954AUD from 1.67AUD

On Wednesday Australia and New Zealand Banking Group reported a significant drop in its net profit and cash profit during the fiscal first half. The company explained the decline by burgeoning bad debt on its ledger.

ANZ Group said that for the six months ended March 31 its cash profit, which is a closely watched metric for banks, decreased to 954 million Australian dollars ($673 million) from 1.67 billion Australian dollars at the same time last year. Analysts on average expected the group to post a cash profit of 1.19 billion Australian dollars.

Meantime, bottom-line net profit declined to 1.42 billion Australian dollars from 1.96 billion Australian dollars in the year-ago half. Bad loans for the recent period more than doubled to 1.37 billion Australian dollars.

Previously ANZ Chief Executive Mike Smith said that the outlook for bad loans in the second half of the fiscal year was "difficult" and the bank won't meet an earlier forecast to limit provisions to between 2.4 billion and 2.5 billion Australian dollars for the entire 2008-09 fiscal year. Besides, the bank also decreased its interim dividend for to 46 Australian cents a share, down from 62 cents for last year's interim payment.