Wells Fargo posts windfall quarterly profit

Jan 15 (Reuters) – Wells Fargo & Co announced an unexpected quarterly profit on Friday, as stabilizing credit costs helped offset the negative impact of low interest rates in the United States to stimulate the economy during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The San Francisco-based bank reported net income of $ 2.99 billion (64 cents per share) for the quarter ended December 31, compared to $ 2.87 billion (60 cents per share) a year earlier. . Analysts had expected a profit of 60 cents a share on average, according to Refinitiv’s IBES estimate.

The costs associated with bad loans decreased by $ 823 million compared to last year and remained well below the level observed in the first half of the year, when the bank accumulated more than 14,000 million dollars in provision expenses.

(Information from Noor Zainab Hussain in Bengaluru and Imani Moise in New York; edited by Bernard Orr; translated by Tomás Cobos)