By Xavier Fontdegloria

Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA said Friday that it posted its highest recurring quarterly profit ever, beating expectations on the back of increasing revenues and lower provisions.

The Spanish lender posted a net profit of 1.65 billion euros ($1.73 billion), a 36% increase compared with the EUR1.21 billion a year earlier. Analysts expected BBVA to report a profit of EUR1.24 billion, according to a consensus forecast provided by the bank.

BBVA said net interest income--the difference between what lenders earn from loans and pay for deposits--rose 21% on year to EUR4.16 billion supported by a strong performance in Mexico, Turkey and South America amid higher interest rates.

Net fees and commissions income increased 9.5% to EUR1.24 billion. Impairments on financial assets declined 20% to EUR738 million.

The bank's fully-loaded common equity Tier 1 ratio, a key measure of resilience, fell to 12.70% in March from 12.75% in December.

BBVA said that it is on track to achieve its long-term goals for 2024. For this year, the lender said in February that it expects a double-digit growth in core revenues and a cost of risk--the ratio of provisions to expected loan losses--of around 1%. The cost of risk stood at 0.82% in March, down from 0.93% in 2021.

Write to Xavier Fontdegloria at xavier.fontdegloria@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 29, 2022 03:00 ET (07:00 GMT)

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