Commonwealth Bank of Australia's first-quarter profit falls 9.6%

Nov 12 (Reuters) - Commonwealth Bank of Australia, the country’s biggest lender, reported a 9.6% drop in first-quarter cash profit on Tuesday, as record-low interest rates squeezed margins.

Cash profit, a measure that excludes one-offs and non-cash accounting items, from continuing operations fell to A$2.26 billion ($1.58 billion) for the three months ended Sept. 30, compared with A$2.50 billion a year earlier, the country's biggest bank said in a limited trading update. (reut.rs/32zGyOL) ($1 = 1.4588 Australian dollars) (Reporting by Nikhil Kurian Nainan and Aby Jose Koilparambil in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta)