Japan's largest lender MUFG posts 6.3% fall in H1 net profit

TOKYO, Nov 13 (Reuters) - Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc (MUFG) reported on Wednesday a 6.3% drop in net profit for the six months through September, as its profit in the same period of last year was buoyed by the release of bad loan provisions.

Japan's largest lender by assets, which owns 24% of Wall Street bank Morgan Stanley, said net profit was 609.9 billion yen ($5.6 billion) in April-September, compared to 650.7 billion yen a year earlier.

MUFG maintained its profit forecast for the year to March-end at 900 billion yen, below the 930 billion yen average of 13 analyst estimates, according to Refinitiv data.

Its net operating profit, however, rose 11.1% due primarily to increase in trading profit. ($1 = 109.1000 yen) (Reporting by Takashi Umekawa; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)