Bank of Valletta in a regular directors' statement to the Stock Exchange said weak demand for business lending continued in the period from October 2014 but it was mitigated by strong demand for home loans.

Customer deposits continued to grow despite the lower interest rates, resulting in higher levels of liquidity.

Part of these incoming funds were invested in short dated, low yield instruments and this served to keep negative returns on overnight deposits to a minimum.

Concurrently, commissions earned on the sale of financial products continued to grow at a satisfactory rate across all key business lines.

Costs for the period under review were higher than the comparative period last year. The increase in costs is primarily attributable to the higher regulatory costs applicable under the Deposit Compensation Scheme (DCS) arising both from changes in the level of contribution required as well as higher volume of the deposits. 

Financial performance is in line with expectations.