Russia: Sberbank boss tells Putin of positive outlook for the lender

Sberbank boss Herman Gref told Russian President Vladimir Putin that its profit was down by over 100 billion roubles ($1.63 billion; €1.47 billion) in the first half of the year as compared to the same period of 2014, in Moscow on Friday. Despite this, Gref welcomed the results saying that in such a “difficult year, in general, the very existence of profit is already very good.” He conceded that the bank anticipates that the “second half of the year [will] be complicated” but said there would be no dip in lending and that the situation would “more or less recover.” Good news for the lender included the fact that it had issued “more than 250 billion roubles in mortgages, of which 64 billion are loans with state support.”