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(Reuters) - Huntington Bancshares on Friday reported a more than two-fold rise in its fourth-quarter profit, helped by robust performance in its capital markets unit and a higher interest income.
The bank has diversified its offerings beyond lending into fee-earning businesses, a strategy that has paid off as companies actively sold stocks and bonds and pursued deals, driving up the fee that lenders charge for such transactions.
Capital markets and advisory fees jumped 74% to $120 million, while wealth and asset management revenue rose 8% to $93 million in the three months ended Dec. 31, Huntington said.
These drove up the company's profit to $530 million, or 34 cents per share, from $243 million, or 15 cents, a year earlier. The profit also beat analysts' expectation of 31 cents, according to data compiled by LSEG.
Shares of the company rose 1.5% in premarket trading on Friday.
Bankers expect global deal volumes to surpass $4 trillion in 2025, the highest in four years, buoyed by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's promise of less regulation, lower corporate taxes and a broadly pro-business stance.
NII EXPECTATIONS FOLLOW TREND
The Columbus, Ohio-based firm expects its 2025 net interest income (NII)-- the difference between what banks earn on loans and pay out for deposits -- to grow 4% to 6% to a record.
Bigger peers Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase have also forecast a jump in their 2025 NII on expectations of strong loan growth and continued normalization of deposit costs as the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates further.
Huntington's NII rose 6% to $1.39 billion in the quarter.
"We delivered exceptional fourth quarter results highlighted by record fee income, accelerated loan growth, and sustained deposit gathering," said chairman and CEO Steve Steinour.
(Reporting by Jaiveer Singh Shekhawat in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)