Woori Financial Group Inc. (WF) Q4 2023 Earnings Call

Investor webinar replay

Replay transcript excerpt

Good afternoon, I am Han Hong-sung, Head of IR at Woorie Financial Group. Let me first begin by thanking everyone for taking time to participate on this earnings call for Woorie Financial Group. On today's call, we have Group CFO Lee Sung-wook, Group CRO Park Jang-geun, and Group CDO Oh Gil-jin participating. For today's call, the CFO Lee Sung-wook will present the earnings performance and Ouray Financial Group's Capital Management Plan, after which the CRO, Park Jang-geun, will walk you through an overview of the group's risk management efforts, and at the end, we will have a Q&A session. In addition, please note that today's call is being interpreted simultaneously for our overseas investors. Now, let us start the presentation on Ouray Financial Group 2023 Business Performance. Good afternoon. I am Lee Sung Wook, CFO of Woorie Financial Group. Let me dive into the 2023 performance of our group. Based on the presentation, which is available on our website, please turn to page three. First, let me discuss the group's 2023 profit and losses. In 2023, Refinancial Group's net income was 2,516.7 billion won, representing a 19.9% decrease year over year. The decline in net income was due to mainly one-off factors, such as preemptive provisions by changing the credit cost calculation components, strengthening the loss absorption capabilities of vulnerable areas within the non-bank subsidiaries, and expenses related to corporate finance programs. Following the steep rise in interest rates, the higher for longer environment has led to increasing concerns by the market on the quality of high risk assets such as real estate project finance and loans to vulnerable borrowers. We have been focusing on our efforts in the fourth quarter to ensure we preemptively address these marke...