KUALA LUMPUR: Alliance Research believes banks' earning momentum will pick up in the coming quarters with accelerated disbursement of Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) corporate loans.

"We are maintaining our 2013 loan growth of seven-nine per cent for now, pending our forthcoming company visits to banks under our coverage," it said in a note today.

The research house said the earnings would also be boosted by higher contribution from the investment banking operations in anticipation of improved capital market activities.

"RHB Cap remains our top pick for the sector while CIMB Holdings as one of the prime beneficiaries of rising business loan stemming from the rolling out of Entry Point Projects under the ETP, which will serve as a good proxy for exposure to robust the Asean region," it added.

"We also maintain that AMMB and Affin will serve as good proxies for exposure to the domestic merger and acquisition theme where foreign strategic shareholders are expected to be raising their shareholdings in the domestic banks," it said.

Hence, Alliance Research has maintained an 'overweight' rating on the banking
sector. Bernama