China banks took 29% of 2011 global profit

LONDON: Chinese lenders accounted for almost a third of global bank profit last year, up from 4 percent in 2007, as they grabbed market share given up by struggling European peers, according to The Banker magazine's annual rankings.

Three Chinese banks topped the profit table, led by Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) for the second successive year, with pretax earnings of $43.2 billion, according to The Banker.