Australia's biggest investment bank Macquarie Group says the operational performance of most of its major businesses improved in the first quarter from the previous three month period.
Macquarie securities, treasury and commodities and banking and financial services made good contributions while Macquarie Capital's performance worsened compared with the fourth quarter of the previous year, Sydney-based Macquarie said today.
The investment bank reiterated the profit forecast given at its annual general meeting in July of about midway between the first and second half profit figures of fiscal 2009.
That would be equivalent to $435.5 million, which would be a 28 per cent decline from a year earlier.
"We continue to maintain a cautious stance with a conservative approach to funding and capital, notwithstanding some improvement in market conditions," Macquarie said in presentation slides for an investment conference.
"Market conditions continue to be volatile, making short-term forecasting extremely difficult."
Macquarie said the profit forecast was subject to completion rate of transactions and asset prices.
One-off items had offset each other during the quarter to June.
The bank also said it had surplus capital and high cash levels and market conditions meant there were medium term growth opportunities.
The company's balance sheet profile as of June 30 was little changed from March 31 with cash and liquid assets making up 40 per cent of assets, while over 50 per cent of funding was from sources maturing beyond 12 months or equity.
The bank said assets under management declined slightly to $235 billion from the end of March. However, the bank said assets under management would be boosted to $361 billion when the recent Delaware Investments acquisition in the US was included.
Macquarie said it had 12,500 staff.