April 29 -- China Merchants Bank (600036) posted a 49.09 percent year-on-year rise in first quarter 2011 net profit attributable to shareholders to 8.81 billion yuan on revenue of 22.32 billion yuan, reports Shanghai Securities News, citing a filing by the bank.

The bank recorded a 38.7 percent year-on-year increase in net interest income to 17.36 billion yuan.

Net interest spread was 2.89 percent while net interest margin hit 2.98 percent.

The balance of non-performing loans (NPL) was 9.26 billion yuan as of end March, a drop of 426 million yuan from the beginning of 2011. The NPL ratio fell 0.07 percentage point to 0.61 percent.

The provision coverage ratio for bad loans rose 32.9 percentage points from the beginning of the year to 335.31 percent as of end March. 

The capital adequacy ratio fell 0.56 percentage point from the beginning of 2011 to 10.91 percent as of end March.

During the same period, core capital adequacy ratio was down 0.38 percentage point to 7.66 percent.