<div id="readability-page-1"><div>Swedish banking group SEB reported fourth-quarter net profits below market expectations on Thursday, dented by softer interest income, but proposed a bigger-than-expected shareholder payout for last year.The bank said in a statement net profit fell to 7.31 billion Swedish crowns ($831 million) from 7.49 billion a year ago to come in short of a mean forecast 7.70 billion seen in a poll of analysts' estimates collected by LSEG. SEB, part of the business sphere centred on Sweden's Wallenberg family, proposed an ordinary shareholder payout of 8.50 crowns per share, in line with last year, as well as an extra dividend of 2.50 crowns per share. Analysts saw the dividend totalling 8.94 crowns, according to LSEG estimates. In the previous year, SEB also paid an additional 3.00 crowns per share in an extraordinary dividend. SEB is the first of Sweden's major banks to publish fourth-quarter results with Swedbank due to report later on Thursday.($1 = 8.7933 Swedish crowns)</div></div>

SBCF

XCHG

FNCL

Swedish bank SEB reported Q4 net profits of 7.31 billion Swedish crowns ($831 million), falling short of the expected 7.70 billion. The decline was attributed to softer interest income. Despite this, SEB proposed a total shareholder payout of 11 crowns per share, including an ordinary dividend of 8.50 crowns and an extra dividend of 2.50 crowns. This is in line with last year's ordinary payout but lower than the previous year's total due to a higher extraordinary dividend last year. SEB is the first major Swedish bank to release Q4 results.

Swedish bank SEB Q4 net profit misses forecast