KARACHI, Aug 25: The National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) on Monday announced that its profit had declined by 13 per cent on year-on-year basis mainly because of higher provisioning and write offs.

The bank posted net profit of Rs7.9bn in first half of 2008 as against earnings of Rs9.0bn in the corresponding period of 2007.

However, the net interest income and non-interest income of the bank increased by 16 per cent and 84 per cent to Rs18.9 billion and Rs7.6bn, respectively, during the period under review.

The total provisioning and write offs went up to Rs5 billion as compared to net reversals of Rs506 million recorded in the first half of 2007.

The operating expenses rose by 28 per cent to Rs8.8 billion in first half of 2008 as against the Rs6.889 billion same period last year.