MOSCOW, July 17 (Xinhua) -- The net profit of Russia's banking sector increased by almost 60 percent from January to June compared with the same period last year, the Russian central bank said Wednesday.
"Net profit of the banking sector for the first half of 2019 amounted to 1.005 trillion rubles (15.96 billion U.S. dollars) against 634 billion rubles (10.07 billion dollars) in January-June 2018," the bank was quoted by TASS news agency as saying in a report.
During the same period, the profitability of assets in the banking sector increased from 1.5 percent to 1.9 percent on a year-on-year basis, according to the report.
As of July 1, the assets of the banking sector amounted to 92.5 trillion rubles (1.47 trillion dollars), retaining an upward trend in June with a 0.2-percent increase, it said.
However, the June growth was lower than the May figures due to a decline in foreign currency assets, according to the central bank.