London
British bank Barclays on Thursday announced a 38-percent slump in net profit for 2020 and said expenses related to the coronavirus pandemic were set to stay high this year.
Profit after tax fell to £1.53 billion ($2.12 billion, 1.76 billion euros), Barclays said in a statement. Group credit impairment charges shot up to £4.8 billion from £1.9 billion owing “to the deterioration in the economic outlook driven by the Covid-19 pandemic”.
Despite the tough year, “Barclays remains well capitalised, well provisioned for impairments… with a strong balance sheet, and competitive market positions across the group”, chief executive Jes Staley said in the statement.
“We expect that our resilient and diversified business model will deliver a meaningful improvement in returns in 2021,” he added.—AFP
