Our BUY call is premised on loan growth (driven by the corporate and retail portfolios), lighter LLPs, and a high dividend yield of 7.5% for this year. Moreover, there would be scope for upside to our earnings projection if KKP were to set lighter LLPs and/or achieve stronger loan growth than we currently assume.
Result was 20% above our expectation
KKP posted 2Q22 earnings of Bt2.0bn, up 50% YoY but down 1% QoQ. The result beat our projection by 20% (and the Bloomberg consensus by 10%), due to lighter LLPs than expected (we had assumed LLPs of Bt1.2bn; the bank set Bt812m in provisions). The 1H22 profit comprises 57.5% of our old full-year forecast of Bt7.1bn.