Citigroup has reported net income of $3.57bn for the fourth quarter of 2016, an increase of 7% compared to $3.33bn a year ago.
Total revenues for the quarter were $17.01bn, a fall of 8% from $18.45 in the fourth quarter of 2015.
The group’s operating expenses dropped 9% to $10.12bn from $11.13bn in the previous year.
The bank’s Global Consumer Banking (GCB) arm posted net income of $1.3bn for the fourth quarter of 2016, a 7% decline compared to the corresponding quarter of 2015.
The unit’s total revenues increased 2% year-on-year to $8bn, while operating expenses were largely flat at $4.4bn.
North America GCB net income stood at $844m for the fourth quarter of 2016, down 15% from the fourth quarter of 2015. The bank said that the fall in income was due to a rise in cost of credit and higher operating expenses, partially offset by the higher revenues.
The unit’s revenues increased 5% to $5.1bn, with higher revenues in Citi-branded cards and flat revenues in Citi retail services partially offset by a decline in retail banking.
Citi CEO Michael Corbat said: "We had a strong finish to 2016, bringing momentum into this year. We drove revenue growth in our businesses and demonstrated strong expense discipline across the firm. We achieved a full year Citicorp efficiency ratio of 58% as we had targeted, while again increasing our loans and deposits.
“Our core businesses are beginning to produce the returns our investors expect and deserve. In 2016, we returned nearly $11 billion in capital to our shareholders. Even with this capital return, we ended the year with a Common Equity Tier 1 Capital ratio of 12.5%, 40 basis points higher than when we started the year, showing the capability of this franchise to consistently generate and return significant amounts of capital,” Corbat added.
