ASB's mortgage book returned to growth in the 2nd half

It's mortgage book stood at $76.51 billion at June 30, up just $488 million from a year earlier.

Chief executive Vittoria Shortt said most home loan customers are now on interest rates above 6%, although about 20% of customers are yet to roll off rates below this.

“The majority of our borrowers are managing in the current environment, although there is no question this is a challenging time for a lot of New Zealanders,” Shortt said.

ASB has reached out to more than 40,000 customers in the past year as they refixed their mortgages, she said.

“To help support borrowers, we have reduced home loan rates more than 10 times since November last year, while we have offered savers some of the highest term deposit rates seen since 2008,” Shortt said.

ASB helped more than 4,600 first home buyers and more than 6,000 KiwiSaver customers used their nest eggs to help with a home deposit, she said.

Wholesale interest rates have been falling and all the banks have been lowering their fixed-rate mortgage rates.

About 4,000 customers accessed the bank's Better Homes top up to help make their homes drier, warmer or more energy efficient.

The bank's total customer deposits grew by 5% in the latest year while its KiwiSaver customers added more than $1.7 billion in contributions to their balances and with investment returns adding another more than $1.5 billion.

ASB's net profit for the year ended June fell 6.7% to $1.46 billion with net interest income falling 3.8% to $2.93 billion while expenses rose 3% to almost $1.3 billion.

The bank said its cash profit, which excludes core banking activities such as hedging, was down 10%.

The bank's charges against profit for bad debts rose to $70 million from $64 million the previous year.

ASB said its cash net interest margin (NIM) fell 16 basis points from the previous year.

However, it's Australian parent, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, showed in a slide that ASB's NIM fell 8 basis points to 2.24% from 2.32% a year earlier and that NIM at June 30 was 3 basis points higher than at Dec 31.