KB Financial Group Inc.
Q4 2020 Earnings Call Transcript

Published: 5 Feb 2021

[Peter Kwon:]

Greetings, I am Peter Kwon, the Head of IR at KBFG. We will now begin the 2020 Q4 Business Results Presentation. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to you for participating in our call. We have here with us our group CFO and SEVP, Ki-Hwan Joo as well as other members from our group management. We will first hear the 2020 major financial highlights from our CFO and SEVP, Ki-Hwan Joo, and then engage in an Q&A session. I would like to invite our CFO and SEVP to elaborate on our 2020 business results highlights.

[Ki-Hwan Joo:]

Good afternoon. I am Ki-Hwan Joo, CFO of KB Financial Group. Thank you for joining, KBFG’s earnings presentation for Q4 2020. Before moving on to our earnings results, let’s briefly look back on last year’s operational environment and KBFG’s key business results. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, global real economy fell into steep contraction and 2020 was an unprecedented year with high volatilities for the financial market as well. For the banking industry, since the 75 basis point cut in the rate by BOK, policy rate continued to be at its historical low, and with greater possibility of asset quality deteriorations with prolonging COVID-19 impact, there were concerns over fall in profitability which lead to share price declines.