Premier Financial Bancorp Inc. of Huntington, W.Va., said fourth-quarter net income jumped 175% from a year earlier, to $1.54 million, continuing a rebound from huge losses in 2002 and 2003 attributed to loan fraud.
Per-share earnings rose 163%, to 29 cents, the $528 million-asset company said Friday.
The five-bank company reported full-year net income of $4.4 million. It earned more in 2004 - nearly $6.7 million - but that figure was skewed by a $4.7 million profit from the sale of a subsidiary bank in July 2004.
Premier blamed net losses of $9.7 million in 2003 and $3.3 million in 2002 on loan fraud at its Farmers Deposit Bank in Eminence, Ky. From 2001 to 2003 that bank's chief executive, since replaced, allegedly made bogus loans to conceal losses from bad loans.
