The online bank eBank Corp. said Friday it posted a pretax profit of 19 million yen in December, its first black ink on a monthly basis since it started operating in July 2001.
EBank specializes in the settlement of payments for small online purchases of goods and services. Capitalized at 18.3 billion yen, the bank currently has some 670,000 individual accounts and more than 140 billion yen in deposits.
EBank officials said the recent growth in service fees focusing on risk-asset management, including the securitization of real estate, led to the profitability achieved in December.
The bank expects to generate 41 million yen in pretax profit for the January-March quarter, the officials said. It also expects a profit of 254 million yen in the first half of fiscal 2004, they said.
"We have built up a model of the online banking business capable of generating profits," eBank Corp. President Taiichi Matsuo said.