Taiwan's Chinatrust Fin revises down H1 net profit

TAIPEI Aug 8 (Reuters) - Chinatrust Financial (2891.TW), Taiwan's top credit card issuer, said on Friday its net profit in the first half was 4 percent lower than previously reported, due to more fallout from the U.S. subprime crisis.

Chinatrust Financial made an additional $21 million write-down against the mortgage loans its U.S. banking branch had made to around 700 clients, bringing its first-half profit down to T$8.91 billion ($287 million).

"The subprime meltdown has had huge impact on the global financial sector," President James Chen told reporters. "If the problem deteriorates, we'll be under pressure to make more bad debt provisions."

Financial companies across Asia, Europe and the U.S. have been hit hard as the U.S. credit crisis worsened.

American International Group Inc (AIG.N) posted its third consecutive quarterly net loss this week, hurt again by the write-down of derivatives linked to bad mortgage investments. [ID:nN06515686]

Chinatrust's latest result came in lower than the T$9.3 billion it had posted in July, but still up 8.6 percent from a year ago, the company said.

Some analysts have been cautious about the outlook of Chinatrust and its local peers as the island's slowing economy dents growth of consumer and corporate loans.

Chinatrust shares ended up 4.15 percent on Friday before the announcement, beating the main TAIEX index's .TWII 2.63 percent gain. ($1=T$31.1) (Reporting by Faith Hung; Editing by Ben Tan)