Investment banking helped Credit Suisse beat second-quarter profit forecasts on Thursday, despite accounting charges and one-off items as the bank continues to cut its balance sheet and win market share.
Credit Suisse reported said it made a net profit of 1.6 billion Swiss francs ($1.50 billion) in the three months, which compared with an average forecast of 1.4 billion francs given in a Reuters poll.
Credit Suisse, which has overtaken UBS as Switzerland's largest bank by market value, has proved resilient in the subprime crisis even though it predicts conditions will remain tough.
"We expect the global economic environment to remain challenging and uneven business condition to persist," Chief Executive Brady Dougan said in a statement.
"However, if markets continue to improve we expect to see further momentum across all our businesses."
The bank's net figure was up 29 percent from the previous year but down 22 percent from a better than expected 2 billion francs made in the first quarter of the year..
Credit Suisse has shone in comparison with domestic rival UBS, which has warned of a second-quarter loss and has yet to recover from the subprime shock despite a state cash injection and a new chief executive.
CS took a 1.1 billion Swiss franc fair value charge resulting from improved spreads on its own debt, more than analysts had expected, and a one-off pre-tax hit of 0.5 billion francs for the settling of the Huntsman legal case in the United States.
Investment banking was a key earnings driver as the bank posted a pre-tax income of 1.655 billion Swiss francs.
The world's fifth-biggest wealth manager attracted 8.5 billion francs of net new assets at its wealth management division. Analysts were forecasting 6.8 billion francs according to the Reuters poll. The bank was also able to improve gross margins.
But asset management remained stagnant, making a minimal contribution to the bank's bottom line.
The bank, one of Europe's best capitalised, said its Tier 1 capiutal adequacy ratio had further strengthened to 15.5 percent from an already robust 14.1 percent at the end of March.
Shares at Credit Suisse have risen 72 percent since the start of the year, outperforming a 28 percent rise in the DJ Stoxx European Banking Index.
