Hi, dear investors. Welcome to the conference call of E.SUN Financial Holding Company for the first quarter of 2025. My name is Chiwei . I'll be the moderator of the meeting today. Alongside with me, there are Martin Lin, who is my colleague in investor relations, and also Sarah Chen, who is the Deputy CFO of E.SUN. First of all, I would like to invite Sarah for a brief opening note.
Dear investors, E.SUN delivered a good performance in the first quarter of this year, making a record high in the quarterly net profit. In this quarter, our net fee income set a new record and growing at a rate of 40.6% YoY. Fee income record double-digit growth in the fourth quarter, in which wealth management fee income grew by nearly 20%. Additionally, credit card transaction amount also marked the highest record for the first quarter in history. Yesterday, we announced the results for April. Growth rate of net profit for the first four months reached 41.2%. Net fee income continues to grow. We're optimistic about our fee income performance this year and expect to achieve good results. Our CI ratio jumped to 47.5%, and we will strictly control the growth rate of expenses to single-digit growth for the whole year.
For overseas expansion, overseas branches, and subsidiaries, net profit continue to grow. FSC has approved the application of Toronto branch, Mumbai branch, and Dallas branch office. E.SUN will continue to expand its footprint across Asia Pacific. Lastly, E.SUN has consistently received recognition in ESG. E.SUN has been listed in the top 5% in corporate governance evaluations for the ninth year by Taiwan Stock Exchange. We will continue to deliver the value for our shareholders. Thank you for your listening.
Thank you, Sarah. Next, I will invite Martin. He will give us an overview of E.SUN's performance and walk through the slides.
Hi, investors. I'm Martin, IR of E.SUN Financial Holding Company. Today, I'll begin my presentation with the summary of E.SUN Financial Holding Company on page one. On page one, the Financial Holding Company and E.SUN Bank's total assets all grow at a very steady path. The Security House, the total assets grow at a very significant amount. For the key financial indicators, our book value per share is TWD 16.47, the double leverage ratio is at 108.10%. The Financial Holding Company's coverage is at 132.63%, all at very adequate level. For the physical channels, the domestic bank channels remain at 139 physical channels unchanged. The overseas channels, now E.SUN has 33 overseas sites in seven countries. The Securities branches, domestically, we have 17 Security branches in Taiwan. On page two is the business and financial review.
For the financial performance, the net revenue of Financial Holding Company was TWD 21.4 billion, the growth rate was 22.5%. The net profit was TWD 8.8 billion, the growth rate was 14.6%. For the Financial Holding Company EPS, it was TWD 0.55, ROE is 13.6%, ROA is 0.86%, both at very strong level. For the subsidiaries, the E.SUN Bank net profit of first quarter 2025, it was TWD 8.7 billion, the growth rate was 54.6%. The Securities profit was TWD 0.4 billion, the venture capital's net profit was TWD 70 million. For the business development, loan balance reached TWD 2.3 trillion, the growth rate was 10.7%, in which the corporate loans grew by 12.3%, the retail loan grew by 9.8%. The total deposit balance grew by 10% year-on-year.
For the net fee income, which is one of the highlights of this quarter, the net fee income was TWD 7 billion, the growth rate was 12.5%, out of which the wealth management fee was TWD 3.5 billion, the growth rate was 18.2%. The credit card fee was TWD 1.9 billion, the growth rate was 8.8%, the card consumption was TWD 136 billion, growing at 4.4%. Both credit card fee and card consumption set a new record high. For the asset quality, E.SUN keeps asset quality at very benign levels. The NPL ratio was 14 basis points, the coverage ratio was 823%. For the business highlight, for the dividends, the dividend yield this year was around 4.5%, in which the cash dividend is TWD 1.2, the stock dividend was TWD 0.1 per share.
The resolution is subject to the approval by the AGM. For the honors and recognitions, E.SUN has been named, awarded with the best bank in Taiwan by FinanceAsia and Forbes. For the ESG development, E.SUN is awarded by the Corporate Governance Association with the best CSR in Asia for the sixth consecutive years. On page three, we will use four graphs to illustrate our financial performance. On top of the slide, you can see the net profit and the EPS all set a new record high in the first quarter. On the bottom of the slide, both our ROE and ROA are at the highest level in the past five years. On slide four is the Financial Holding Company and subsidiaries net income.
E.SUN Bank remains the main revenue contributor to the Financial Holding Company, which accounts for 94.5% of the net income of E.SUN Financial Holding Company. The Security House accounts for 4.8%, and the venture capital accounts for 0.7%. On page five, it shows the net profit breakdown. E.SUN continue to follow the golden rule, of course, which our net profit growth is higher than our net revenue growth, and which is higher than our operating expense growth. On page six is the breakdown of the Financial Holding Company revenue. The total revenue is TWD 21 billion, and the net interest income accounts for 43%, followed by the net fee income, accounts for 32.8%, and the fixed income and others accounts for 24.2%. On the right-hand side is the YoY comparison.
Across all the income sectors of financial holding company, we all deliver a very positive growth in the first quarter. On page seven is the breakdown of the net fee income. On left-hand side, you can see wealth management accounts for 15.2% of the net fee income, followed by the credit card, which is 27.3%. On the right-hand side, you can see the wealth management fee income is grown by 18.2%, which after a very high growth last year, which is 45%, we still deliver a very strong performance this year in terms of the wealth management business. For the credit card, the growth rate of credit card fee income was 8.8%. On page eight is the breakdown of the wealth management fee, and the bancassurance accounts for 39.3% of the wealth management, and the mutual fund accounts for 14.4%.
On the right-hand side, you can see the growth rate of mutual fund was 21.7%, and the bancassurance is 32.7%. What is worth mentioning is that the bancassurance has been growing more than double digits in the past three years, and we still deliver a 32.7% in the first quarter of 2025. On page nine, we use four graphs to illustrate our credit card business breakdown. On the top of the slide, both active card and card consumptions market share, we keep our market share at very decent level. The active card's market share is 12.7%, and the card consumption's market share is 12.4%. On page 10 is the business overview of E.SUN Security House.
At the bottom of the slide, both the revenue and profit declined slightly this first quarter, mainly due to the lower trading value in the stock market. However, E.SUN Securities' ROE still remains at very strong level, which is 37.3%, and this is one of the highest ROE of the Security House under the financial holding companies in Taiwan. On page 11 is our business overview of our overseas development. The overseas branches and the subsidiaries net profit grew by 17.8% and contribute to 26.5% of the total net profit of E.SUN Bank. Now the overseas loan balance grew by 17% in the first quarter of 2025, year-on-year. On page 12 is the deposit and the loan structures. For the total deposit of E.SUN Bank, year-to-date growth is 1.9%, and year-on-year growth was 10%.
For the total loan, the year-to-date growth, it was 1.2%, and for the year-on-year growth, it was 10.7%. Of which the foreign currency loans year-to-date growth was 3.8%, and for year-on-year growth was very strong, it was 18.7%. On page 13 is the loan portfolio breakdown. The total loan balance of E.SUN was TWD 2.3 trillion. E.SUN keeps a very balanced loan structures, of which the SME loan accounts for 25.8%, and the large corporate accounts for 21.8%. Mortgage accounts for 23%, and the secured personal loan accounts for 21%. On the right-hand side, you can see across all the loan sectors, we will deliver a positive growth in the first quarter. On page 14 is the deposit structures.
The overall LDR is 69.4%, and the foreign currency LDR is 38.3%, which has been growing very consistently in the last three years. On the right-hand side is the deposit structures. The balance of Taiwan dollar demand deposits grew at 4.6% year-on-year, and the foreign currency deposit grew by 11.5% year-on-year. On page 15 is the NIM and spread. E.SUN reported our NIM as 1.3% in the first quarter of 2025, which remains the same as the last quarter. On the right-hand side is the spread, E.SUN has a very significant spread improvement in this quarter. The total spread is 1.33%, and that's thanks to the well-managed of our funding cost control, which you can see the total overall deposit rate declined by 5 basis points in the first quarter of 2025. On page 16 is the asset quality.
E.SUN keeps our asset quality at a very benign level. The NPL ratio was 14 basis points, and the coverage ratio was 823%. The credit cost is 5 basis points this quarter. On page 17 is the different business NPL, for the Corporates, the NPL was 10 basis points, and for the mortgage, it was 6 basis points. On the right-hand side, shows the NPL of E.SUN and the comparison with the market. You can see in end of 2024 and the first quarter of 2025, E.SUN's NPL is below the market's average. On page 18 is the cost-income ratio. E.SUN had a very significant improvement compared to last year, which was 52.1%. In the first quarter of this year, the cost-income ratio is 47.5%.
E.SUN will strictly control our costs and to deliver a better cost-income ratio in the over years. On page 19 is the capital adequacy ratio. For the Financial Holding Company, the CAR ratio is 132.66%. For the bank's BIS ratio, the common equity Tier 1 ratio is at 11.63%, and the BIS ratio of bank is 15.26%, and they are all at very adequate level. On last page is our sustainable development. In this regard, E.SUN will keep doing well in the ESG development and to deliver a more consistent performance in both ESG or corporate and our corporate governance. That's the end of the presentation, we can now start to take the questions.
Thank you, Martin. Now we will proceed to the Q and A session. Please fill your question into the dialog box. Okay, now we have the first question coming in, it is about the macroeconomy of Taiwan. In light of the uncertainty of the reciprocal tariff by President Trump, what is the impact on the macroeconomy of Taiwan? Due to the uncertainty, many companies have taken a pause on their investment plans. In the first quarter, the U.S. economy also demonstrated a negative growth, mainly because of the larger growth in the import sector. In Taiwan, so far the economy is quite stable. In the first quarter, the GDP growth rate was more than 5%.
Though there are still many uncertainties around the tariff policies, also the Taiwanese economy is highly related to the semiconductor tariff policies, which is going to be proposed by the U.S. government. The Taiwanese industries have been very resilient over many years and during many business cycles, and we are quite confident that the Taiwanese companies can have the resilience to overcome the current instability. So far, the macroeconomy is still quite stable, but we will be very concerned and also be very cautious about the outlook and the performance in future. We have the second question. It is about the NIM and spread outlook of E.SUN, and I will invite Sarah to answer this question.
Our forecast about the NIM and spread for this year will maintain at modest growth, both around 3 basis points . Besides continuously managing our funding cost, we believe the normalization of yield curve allows assets to be locked in a relatively high level. The steady growth of foreign currency loans provides high yield compared to domestic loans. Through customer segmentation adjustments, loan interest rates have the room to be increased within acceptable risk level. We believe all these factors will contribute to the improvement of NIM and spread.
We have the third question. It is about the loan performance of E.SUN. The foreign currency loan growth is greater than the NTD dollar loan growth. The question is about the future momentum and also if the migration of supply chain will also bring more momentum for the loan growth. First of all, the foreign currency loan growth is mainly driven by the overseas demand, and mainly out of the overseas local businesses, including the renewable energy project financing and the financing for the construction of data center, which is less influenced by the tariff and the business cycle. The business momentum has been quite stable and quite strong. Also, we are now in the entrance of the negotiation for reciprocal tariff. Many companies of Taiwan, they are actually benefited by the tariff, because some orders from China are actually transferred to other countries, including Taiwan.
In the short run, the trade finance and the loan demand will be quite robust in the short run. However, because of the uncertainties of the tariff, so many companies are still on hold with their investment projects. It will take time when the situation becomes more clear, then the companies will decide how they will react. However, some of the big companies in electronics or some of the companies who are more competitive or companies who enjoy higher profit margin, they are still continuing their projects, and that includes their investment project in the North America. This will continue to be the business momentum and the loan demand in the near future. It seems we have answered all the questions for the conference call this evening, so we will call it a day.
Thank you for your participation in the earnings call of E.SUN Financial Holding Company. There will be a rerun of this conference call recording a few minutes later. Thank you for your participation. Goodbye.