ING posts 3Q2023 net result of €1,982 million, driven by strong income in both Retail and Wholesale Banking

CEO statement
“ING recorded another strong set of results in the third quarter of 2023, with net result more than doubling on the prior year“, said Steven van Rijswijk, CEO of ING. “Notwithstanding the cooling economy and amid polarising geopolitical developments, which impacted business and consumer confidence, both our Retail and Wholesale Banking businesses posted strong results. Their interest income benefited from the positive rate environment and fee income also increased, especially in Retail Banking, driven by daily banking and investment products.

“I’m proud that we gained another 181,000 primary customers to reach a total of 15.1 million. This growth occurred across almost all of our 10 retail markets, especially in Germany, Australia and Türkiye, further supporting our future value creation. Customers value our services, as shown in our net promoter scores, where we maintained our number one position in five of our 10 Retail Banking markets. A superior customer experience is a pillar of our ‘making the difference’ strategy. An example is digital onboarding. In many markets we now onboard most of our new retail customers fully digitally: 75% in the Netherlands, 72% in Australia and 63% in Germany – percentages that are all growing.

“The cycle of recent central bank rate hikes, which helped the recovery of our profitability after a prolonged period of negative rates, appears to have paused. We are conscious of the public discussions on saving rates and, depending on developments in the competitive landscape, our liability margins may reduce somewhat from current levels. Overall income will be supported by our strong and diversified businesses, especially when loan demand recovers.

“Wholesale Banking showed solid income growth as continued rates increases resulted in improved margins for Payments & Cash Management, and Financial Markets benefited from strong trading results. We focused on further optimising our capital usage and margins while decreasing risk weights, prioritising own origination of high-quality loans.

“Expenses remained under control with year-on-year cost growth (excluding incidentals) below 5%. Risk costs were again low – a testament to the quality of our loan book and our prudent credit risk management. We remain vigilant, given global economic growth is slowing down.

“In October, we published our Climate Report, setting out our progress on the path to net zero, including how we engage with clients. We also explain our work to assess climate risks and how we take action to mitigate them. One of the key challenges we face is balancing the world’s need for urgent action with helping drive economic progress and supporting the transition. We are proud of how we are using our financing to help our clients in this, but we can’t do it alone. Next to detailed transition plans for the nine most carbon-intensive sectors in our loan portfolio, the report includes specific calls to action on governments and regulators to guide the transition more firmly.

“We continue to take steps to converge our capital ratios to our target level of around 12.5%, today announcing another share buyback programme. We do this from a position of strength, convinced that operating at the right level of capital is in the best interest of all stakeholders and allows us to support the economy and our more than 38 million customers in over 40 countries.

“These are uncertain times and it is hard to predict the impact of geopolitical conflicts. However, I’m confident that we are well positioned to withstand adverse challenges and continue to make a difference. I would like to thank everyone who contributed to our performance during the third quarter.“ 

Additional financial information is available at www.ing.com/qr:
• Full ING Group 3Q 2023 press release (PDF)
• ING Group Results presentation (PDF)
• ING Group Credit Update presentation (PDF)
• ING Group Historical Trend Data (PDF and XLS)

A short ING ON AIR video with CEO Steven van Rijswijk discussing our 3Q 2023 results is available on Youtube.

For further information on ING, please visit www.ing.com. Frequent news updates can be found in the Newsroom or via the @ING_news X/Twitter feed. Photos of ING operations, buildings and its executives are available for download at Flickr.

Steven van Rijswijk, Tanate Phutrakul and Ljiljana Čortan will also discuss the results in a media call on 2 November 2023 at 11:00 a.m. CET. Journalists are welcome to join the call via +31 20 708 5073 (NL) or +44 330 551 0200 (UK), (quote ING Media Call 3Q2023 when prompted by the operator). The meeting can also be followed via live audio webcast at www.ing.com.

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Elements of this press release contain or may contain information about ING Groep N.V. and/ or ING Bank N.V. within the meaning of Article 7(1) to (4) of EU Regulation No 596/2014. 

ING Group’s annual accounts are prepared in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards as adopted by the European Union (‘IFRS- EU’). In preparing the financial information in this document, except as described otherwise, the same accounting principles are applied as in the 2022 ING Group consolidated annual accounts. All figures in this document are unaudited. Small differences are possible in the tables due to rounding.

Certain of the statements contained herein are not historical facts, including, without limitation, certain statements made of future expectations and other forward-looking statements that are based on management’s current views and assumptions and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results, performance or events to differ materially from those expressed or implied in such statements. Actual results, performance or events may differ materially from those in such statements due to a number of factors, including, without limitation: (1) changes in general economic conditions and customer behaviour, in particular economic conditions in ING’s core markets, including changes affecting currency exchange rates and the regional and global economic impact of the invasion of Russia into Ukraine and related international response measures (2) ongoing and residual effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and related response measures on economic conditions in countries in which ING operates (3) changes affecting interest rate levels (4) any default of a major market participant and related market disruption (5) changes in performance of financial markets, including in Europe and developing markets (6) fiscal uncertainty in Europe and the United States (7) discontinuation of or changes in ‘benchmark’ indices (8) inflation and deflation in our principal markets (9) changes in conditions in the credit and capital markets generally, including changes in borrower and counterparty creditworthiness (10) failures of banks falling under the scope of state compensation schemes (11) non-compliance with or changes in laws and regulations, including those concerning financial services, financial economic crimes and tax laws, and the interpretation and application thereof (12) geopolitical risks, political instabilities and policies and actions of governmental and regulatory authorities, including in connection with the invasion of Russia into Ukraine and the related international response measures (13) legal and regulatory risks in certain countries with less developed legal and regulatory frameworks (14) prudential supervision and regulations, including in relation to stress tests and regulatory restrictions on dividends and distributions (also among members of the group) (15) ING’s ability to meet minimum capital and other prudential regulatory requirements (16) changes in regulation of US commodities and derivatives businesses of ING and its customers (17) application of bank recovery and resolution regimes, including write down and conversion powers in relation to our securities (18) outcome of current and future litigation, enforcement proceedings, investigations or other regulatory actions, including claims by customers or stakeholders who feel misled or treated unfairly, and other conduct issues (19) changes in tax laws and regulations and risks of non-compliance or investigation in connection with tax laws, including FATCA (20) operational and IT risks, such as system disruptions or failures, breaches of security, cyber-attacks, human error, changes in operational practices or inadequate controls including in respect of third parties with which we do business (21) risks and challenges related to cybercrime including the effects of cyberattacks and changes in legislation and regulation related to cybersecurity and data privacy (22) changes in general competitive factors, including ability to increase or maintain market share (23) inability to protect our intellectual property and infringement claims by third parties (24) inability of counterparties to meet financial obligations or ability to enforce rights against such counterparties (25) changes in credit ratings (26) business, operational, regulatory, reputation, transition and other risks and challenges in connection with climate change and ESG-related matters, including data gathering and reporting (27) inability to attract and retain key personnel (28) future liabilities under defined benefit retirement plans (29) failure to manage business risks, including in connection with use of models, use of derivatives, or maintaining appropriate policies and guidelines (30) changes in capital and credit markets, including interbank funding, as well as customer deposits, which provide the liquidity and capital required to fund our operations, and (31) the other risks and uncertainties detailed in the most recent annual report of ING Groep N.V. (including the Risk Factors contained therein) and ING’s more recent disclosures, including press releases, which are available on www.ING.com.

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