Scotsman.com Business - RBS cashes in with record pre-tax profit of �4.5bn

Scotsman.com Business - RBS cashes in with record pre-tax profit of �4.5bn: "RBS cashes in with record pre-tax profit of �4.5bn
JIM STANTON
DEPUTY BUSINESS EDITOR (jstanton@edinburghnews.com)
ROYAL Bank of Scotland (RBS) today became the latest of Britain's top high street banks to issue record-breaking half-year results, announcing it had made a pre-tax profit of �4.51 billion.
That was a jump of 23 per cent from the �3.68bn the Edinburgh-based bank made over the same period the year before.
And it comfortably beat City expectations - analysts had envisaged the world's fifth-biggest bank making around �4.35bn.
The group, which was wrapping up the banking sector's interim reporting season, also managed to keep a lid on bad debt. It said the amount it was setting aside to cover bad debt would be �887 million, just five per cent higher than the first half of 2005. That was one of the smaller impairment charge increases from the leading UK banks, and it pales beside the 50 per cent increase announced by Barclays yesterday.
However, on the retail side of the business, bad loan provision jumped by 19 per cent to �680m as more people struggle to cope with paying back unsecured borrowing such as personal loans.
RBS - which owns the likes of NatWest, Churchill and Direct Line in the UK and Charter One Financial and Citizens in the United States, as well as a stake in the Bank of China - said its profit jump had stemmed from strong growth in its corporate markets unit and through tight cost controls. Its ratio of costs to income dipped to 41.9 per cent from 42.2 per cent and it had seen customer growth 'in all divisions'.
Overall income was up by ten per cent to �13.64bn, with UK revenues up seven per cent to �9.82bn and international revenues increasing by 17 per cent to �3.821bn.
RBS' corporate m"