Troubled Aiful Corp. reported Tuesday that its net profit for fiscal 2005 dropped 13.1 percent to 65.827 billion yen on a consolidated basis due to a rise in customer demands that excess interest on loans be returned.
The outlook is even grimmer for the major consumer lender; it was ordered by the Financial Services Agency on April 14 to suspend some business operations at its approximately 1,900 outlets nationwide for three to 25 days for illegal loan collection practices.
Aiful expects group net profit to decline 20.2 percent for the current business year to 52.54 billion yen due to the FSA punishment.