Advertisement

CORRECTED-UPDATE 1-Brazil's BTG sees net income climb 52% in Q1

(Corrects cost increase to 84%, not 41%)

SAO PAULO, May 11 (Reuters) - Brazilian bank BTG Pactual SA on Tuesday reported a first-quarter net income of 1.197 billion reais ($229.14 million), up 51.7% from a year earlier with growth seen in most of its business units.

BTG's return on equity, a gauge of profitability, was at 16.8%, a drop of 2.3 percentage points from the previous quarter.

Its total revenues climbed 84% year-on-year, to 2.796 billion reais, helped by a busy deal-making quarter for BTG's investment banking unit, higher influx of money to the bank's funds and intense trading activity.

New influx of money to its funds reached a record of 76 billion reais in the first quarter, BTG said.

Costs went up 84% from a year earlier, to 1.199 million reais, boosted by a five-fold growth in bonuses paid.

BTG said it had concluded the sale of its 22.25% stake in Swiss private bank EFG International AG to its controlling shareholder BTG Pactual Holding for 3.8 billion reais, a plan announced two years ago.

Shares in BTG are up roughly 20% this year, outperforming Brazil's biggest lenders as analysts are bullish about the bank's inroads into retail banking. ($1 = 5.2238 reais) (Reporting by Carolina Mandl, editing by Louise Heavens and Estelle Shirbon)