Agricultural Bank of China profit up 0.5%

The Agricultural Bank of China, one of the country's largest state-owned banks, reported on Thursday a net profit increase of 0.5 percent year on year to 104.56 billion yuan (16.32 billion U.S. dollars) in the first half of 2015.

Its non-performing loan ratio, however, edged up to 1.83 percent, up 0.29 percentage point from the end of 2014, the bank said.

Non-performing loans stood at 159.54 billion yuan at the end of June, up 34.57 billion yuan from the end of last year.

This rise is under control, according to the bank's report.

The bank's total assets hit 17.46 trillion yuan at the end of June, up 9.3 percent from the end of 2014.

Its outstanding loans for small and micro businesses totaled 1.05 trillion yuan in the January-June period, with a growth speed of 8.2 percent.

The bank's shares surged 5.3 percent to 2.98 yuan per share on the Shanghai bourse Thursday.