By Lee C. Chipongian United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB) posted a four percent decline in net income as of end-September to P2.91 billion from P3 billion same time in 2017. UCPB president and CEO Higinio O. Macadaeg Jr. expects the “challenging environment” to continue up to the last three months of 2018 but he also projects its strong sides, mainly consumer lending, will remain stable. “We will focus on businesses where we are particularly strong such as consumer lending, especially the real estate segment, and bancassurance, which stand to grow with the continued expansion of the bank’s consumer loan portfolio,” he said in a statement. UCPB’s bancassurance is with United Coconut Planters Life Assurance Corp. or COCOLIFE and UCPB General Insurance Co. Macadaeg said they are increasing loan loss provisions in the fourth quarter which he said was a “conservative move to cover the bank’s growing loan portfolio.” In the third quarter, UCPB said higher interest rates has limited its trading opportunities in fixed income securities and also affected its net interest margins. The bank reported a lower net interest income of P8.31 billion as of end-September, or four percent down from P8.62 billion same period last year. Total interest income of P11.44 billion was up 10 percent year-on-year. Its lending was higher at P178.48 billion or up 11 percent from P161.26 billion, mostly boosted by consumer loans. The bank said its non-interest income of P1.82 billion was down by 2.15 percent from P1.86 billion end-September 2017, as “higher revenues from service charges, fees, bancassurance commissions and foreign exchange in the first nine months of the year could not fully offset the contraction of trading and securities gain.”