BEIJING, March 27 (Xinhua) -- China CITIC Bank, one of the country's leading banks, saw its net profits rise 4.57 percent year on year in 2018.

Net profits reached 44.51 billion yuan (about 6.63 billion U.S. dollars) last year, while revenue grew 5.2 percent to 164.85 billion yuan, according to the bank's annual report.

Net interest incomes stood at 104.77 billion yuan in 2018, up 5.15 percent from the previous year, accounting for about 63.6 percent of the revenue.

By the end of last year, asset value amounted to 6.07 trillion yuan, a 6.85-percent year-on-year increase, the report showed.

The lender's non-performing loan ratio edged up 0.09 percentage points year on year to stand at 1.77 percent by the end of December.