European banks upbeat

As they reported their 2009 figures, several major European banks were upbeat about the year ahead.

France’s biggest high street bank, Credit Agricole said despite losses at its Greek bank Emporiki, it had made a good start to the year.

Agricole’s net profit rose to 433 million euros

Royal Bank of Scotland, which is 84 percent owned by the UK government after a series of bailouts during the financial crisis, posted a seven billion euro loss, but said prospects are brighter for the coming year.

Deutsche Postbank, Germany’s largest retail bank in numbers of customers, suffered an 398 euro pretax loss last year.

But it said lower loan loss provisions and lower writedowns on toxic assets will help it achieve a pretax profit in 2010.

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