Business

Citigroup doubles quarterly profits but misses estimates

Citigroup CEO Michael Corbat was able to more than doubled fourth-quarter profit from a year earlier by cutting expenses, but the bank still missed Wall Street estimates.

Citigroup reported on Thursday a profit of $2.69 billion, or 85 cents a share, compared with a profit of $1.2 billion, or 38 cents a share, for the fourth quarter of 2012, which was weighed down by $2.3 billion in legal charges and costs tied to layoffs.

Revenue edged down 0.8% to $17.78 billion. Shares of Citigroup were down 3 percent in premarket trading.

Meanwhile, stripping out one-time items and accounting adjustments, per-share earnings were up at 82 cents from 69 cents. Revenue dropped 2.5% on an adjusted basis to $17.94 billion.

Analysts expected per-share earnings of 95 cents on revenue of $18.18 billion.

Corbat’s vow to get expenses under control paid off in the quarter, with operating expenses dropping 5.9 percent from the year earlier to $11.93 billion. And the bank ended 2013 with net income of $13.9 billion, its highest figure since before the financial crisis.

This article originally appeared on Marketwatch.com.