According to pre-audited data, banks earned a profit of EUR 986 million in 2023 (after solidarity contribution and other taxes), twice as much as in 2022 (EUR 491 million). The large increase in profits is due to the unexpected result of a sharp rise in interest rates in the context of atypical, and particularly high excess liquidity.
A total of 14 banks and branches of foreign banks operated at profit while four banks were loss-making. The latter suffered a combined loss of EUR 9.7 million. These are recently established specialised banks, with their operating costs still higher than their income.
Banks’ assets grew by EUR 6.1 billion (11%) to EUR 61.7 billion over the year.
Banks allocated part of their profits to national defence as they made a solidarity contribution of EUR 250 million to the state budget, which was proposed by the Bank of Lithuania at the beginning of 2023. The solidarity contribution for 2024 is expected to be around EUR 220 million.
In 2023, the banks’ loan portfolio rose by EUR 1.6 billion to EUR 27.5 billion, with credit granted mostly to households (55%). These loans grew by EUR 1.3 billion over the year.
Last year, deposits with banks increased by EUR 4.4 billion or 9.4% to EUR 50.8 billion.
The most significant change is that the population has started to put money to work: the share of fixed-term deposits increased from 13% to 26% of customer deposits. Over the year, the value of fixed-term deposits grew by EUR 3 billion to EUR 6.6 billion, while the value of current deposits fell by EUR 1.1 billion to EUR 16 billion.
Banks also observed a rise in financial fraud, with more than 10,000 fraud cases recorded during the year – 33% more than in 2022. Banks’ efforts prevented major losses as they stopped suspicious transactions worth more than EUR 7 million in total.
There are 18 banks operating in the country, including five branches of foreign banks.