NIB's parent company Danske Bank reported higher-than-expected first-quarter pretax profit of $741 million today but NIB posted a loss on accont of the cost of integrating into the Danish operation.
National Irish Bank reported a pre tax loss of €5 million, reflecting the heavy costs associated with integrating the bank's IT onto Danske's technology platform.
NIB said customer lending, was up 47 per cent from March 2005. Lending to personal customers increased by 39 per cent year on year while business lending was up 52 per cent year on year.
Mortgage lending for the period increased by 40 per cent with over 60 per cent of new business in the quarter coming from customers of other banks who switched to National Irish Bank.
"Despite the costs related to the change programme, the underlying business performed strongly" said Andrew Healy, NIB's chief executive.
Mr Healy said the integration of NIB into Danke has been completed and the resp[onse to the bank's re-launch has been "encouraging".
" We are very confident about the future as we seek to clearly differentiate National Irish Bank in Irish banking," Mr Healy said.