Russia's Sberbank reports small profit rise, says high rates still constrain lending growth

MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russia's dominant lender Sberbank on Tuesday reported a slight increase in second-quarter net profit to 422.9 billion roubles ($5.19 billion), from 418.7 billion roubles a year earlier.

Sberbank has coped relatively well with high interest rates squeezing lending portfolio growth. Banks are set to benefit with interest rates now coming down, allaying concerns about a rise in the share of consumer debt falling overdue.

"Since the beginning of the year, the total loan portfolio has increased in real terms by 2.1% to 46.1 trillion roubles, mainly due to the issuance of preferential mortgage loans and project financing," Sberbank CEO German Gref said in a statement.

"At the same time, in the consumer credit segment, the high level of interest rates continues to restrain growth in lending activity."

Hoping to revive lending and boost flagging economic growth after stubbornly high inflation showed signs of easing, Russia's central bank cut its key interest rate by 200 basis points to 18% on Friday, the biggest cut in borrowing costs since May 2022.

Sberbank acknowledged in its half-year report that the quality of its loan portfolio remained under pressure from high rates.

The share of third-stage loans - those with high credit risk, typically loans more than 90 days overdue - rose to 3.8% for corporate loans in the second quarter and to 5.3% in the retail segment, up from 3.6% and 4.7% in the previous quarter.

($1 = 81.5500 roubles)

(Reporting by Elena Fabrichnaya and Alexander Marrow; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)