Royal Bank earnings down 15% in Q1

Royal Bank said Thursday its first-quarter profit tumbled 15 per cent — but it still made more than $1 billion.

The bank said it made $1.05 billion, or 73 cents a share, down from $1.25 billion, or 95 cents a share, a year earlier.

The bank's shares rose $1.91, or 6.37 per cent, to $31.90 in Toronto trading Thursday.

Royal said its provision for bad loans in the quarter rose sharply to $747 million from $293 million.

The bank's return on common equity for the quarter was 13.8 per cent, off from 21.5 per cent in the same quarter of the previous year.

Royal Bank left its quarterly common share dividend unchanged at 50 cents a share.

"These results reflect the strength of our Canadian businesses and demonstrate the value of our diversified business model," said RBC president and CEO Gord Nixon.

RBC's Canadian banking unit posted net income of $696 million, up three per cent year-over-year on lending volume growth across all of its businesses. However, the unit's charge for credit losses increased $56 million over last year.

RBC's wealth management group saw its net income come in at $128 million, down 29 per cent or $53 million over last year due to the impact of weak capital markets.

Provisions for bad loans and investment losses sent RBC's international banking division to a net loss of $144 million, down $175 million from net income of $31 million a year ago.

The bank's investment arm, RBC Capital Markets, posted net income of $225 million, down 26 per cent year-over-year.

RBC's overall revenue for the quarter was $6.94 billion, up from $5.65 billion.