MADRID (Reuters) -Spain's Santander on Wednesday said its net profit in the first quarter jumped almost five times on lower loan provisions and boosted by record earnings at its U.S. unit and strong growth in the UK.
The euro zone second-biggest lender in terms of market value booked a net profit of 1.608 billion euros ($1.94 billion) up from 331 million euros in the same quarter last year.
The bank didn't book any COVID-19 related provisions in the quarter like in the same quarter last year when it set aside around 1.6 billion euros to protect its books against the potential impact from the pandemic.
Analysts polled by Reuters expected the Spanish lender to post a profit of 1.38 billion euros.
($1 = 0.8282 euros)
(Reporting by Jesús Aguado, editing by Inti Landauro)
