ABN AMRO announced that going forward its Corporate & Institutional Banking (CIB) group will exit all non-European corporate banking activities, focusing on clients in Northwest Europe. Trade & Commodity Finance activities will be discontinued completely, and Natural Resources and Transportation & Logistics will focus on European clients only. In addition, stricter lending criteria and credit limits have been set to also contribute to a moderate risk profile. CIB will be split into core and non-core activities. The non-core activities (around 45% of CIB’s client loans, representing approximately 35% of CIB’s RWA and over 10% of total RWA) are expected to be wound down in the next 3 to 4 years. Around 800 FTEs are currently dedicated to non-core activities. The winddown, which is subject to regulatory approval, is expected to be capital accretive over time.

The bank said that even though in the Netherlands the impact of the soft lockdown on the economy was less severe than in many countries, Covid-19 has had a significant impact on our financial performance and we are reporting an around breakeven net result (EUR 5 million negative) for the second quarter. Operational performance was good despite continued pressure on net interest income. Costs were lower, benefiting from continued cost management. Impairments were high again, due to an exceptional client file, Covid-19 and oil prices. The resilience of our operating performance will not fully offset expected impairments for full-year 2020. ROE was a disappointing -0.7% and the cost/income ratio was 60.4%. Our financial position remains strong, with a CET1 ratio of 17.3% under Basel III, around 14% under Basel IV, comfortably above the regulatory minimum requirement.