The country's fourth-biggest lender by market value reported a net profit of 130 million euros ($140.4 million) in the October to December period compared to 82 million euros in the same quarter of 2021.

Analysts polled by Reuters expected a net profit of 132 million euros.

For the whole of 2022, net profit fell 58% to 560 million euros down from 1.33 billion euros in 2021, when the bank booked net capital gains of 896 million euros from the listing of its insurance business LDA.

When stripping out the effect of LDA on the bottom line, net profit in 2022 rose 28% and ended above the pre-pandemic levels of 551 million euros recorded in 2019, and also one year ahead of its own target.

($1 = 0.9264 euros)

(Reporting by Jesús Aguado; editing by Inti Landauro)