Capital One Financial Reports Q4 Revenues $4.10B vs $4.14B Est

Fourth quarter loan balances up 4.6 percent from third quarter and up 7.9 percent from prior year's fourth quarter Revenue down modestly in fourth quarter due to absence of Q3 finance charge and fee reserve release and Q4 impact of UK reserve, revenue up modestly excluding these items Non-interest expense up, driven by increased marketing and operating expenses Continued balance sheet strength; Tier 1 Common Equity Ratio near 10 percent Capital One Financial Corporation

today announced net income for the fourth quarter of 2011 of $407 million, or $0.88 per diluted common share, compared with net income of $813 million, or $1.77 per diluted common share, for the third quarter of 2011, and net income of $697 million, or $1.52 per diluted common share, for the fourth quarter of 2010. For full year 2011, net income was $3.1 billion, or $6.80 per diluted common share, compared with net income of $2.7 billion, or $6.01 per diluted common share, for 2010. "In 2011, we made significant investments to restart growth across our lending businesses after a long period of cyclical declines in loan volumes, and we're seeing these investments gain traction," said Richard D. Fairbank, Capital One's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. "The strong underlying performance of our businesses and the compelling financial and strategic value of our planned acquisitions put us in a position to deliver and sustain shareholder value through growth potential, strong returns, and strong capital generation." The company expects to close the acquisition of ING Direct in the first quarter and the acquisition of the HSBC US Card business in the second quarter, and expects that the acquisitions will have significant impact on reported results, especially in 2012, from the purchase accounting effects, integration expenses and partial year impacts of these acquisitions. All comparisons in the following paragraphs are for fourth quarter 2011 compared to third quarter 2011 unless otherwise noted.