Bank earnings rewrite

Steven Lamb | March 9, 2010

Recession? Not at Canada's five biggest banks. Collectively they have posted just under $5.1 billion in profits for the quarter ended Jan. 31.

By way of comparison, they had earned just under $3 billion in the same period a year earlier.  Put another way, $5.1 billion is roughly equal to the full-year 2009 gross domestic product of Liechtenstein, according to the CIA World Fact Book.

Much of the increase has been attributed to lower loan loss provisions, while increased mortgage activity has also helped.

Four out of five of the banks beat analyst expectations, while RBC's mere $1.5 billion fell short of estimates, despite posting the largest profit for the group.

Scotiabank was the last of the Big Five to report, with its $998 million profit marking a rise of 17% over last year.