By Elena Vardon


Barclays confirmed its 2024 guidance as it reported a better-than-expected fall in pretax profit for the first quarter.

The British lender on Thursday posted a pretax profit for the three months ended March 31 of 2.28 billion pounds ($2.84 billion) compared with GBP2.60 billion a year earlier. Pretax profit was expected to reach GBP2.195billion, according a company-compiled consensus.

The FTSE 100-listed bank's total income slipped to GBP6.95 billion from GBP7.24 billion a year prior, coming in slightly ahead of consensus's GBP6.89 billion. The 4% fall was attributed to lower fixed income instruments, currencies and commodities income in its investment bank, lower inflation-linked income and adverse product dynamics in Barclays U.K. deposits and mortgages. This more than offset higher structural hedge income, strong equities performance and balance growth in its U.S. consumer bank, it said.

The group reported Barclays U.K. net interest income--the difference between what banks earn on loans and pay clients for deposits--of GBP1.55 billion and a net interest margin of 3.09%.

Barclays backed its guidance for total income of GBP10.7 billion for the year, which includes GBP6.1 billion in net interest income from Barclays U.K. It still expects return on tangible equity to be above 10% for 2024 and posted a 12.3% return for the first quarter, ahead of estimates of 11.7%.


Write to Elena Vardon at elena.vardon@wsj.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

04-25-24 0244ET