Germany's Commerzbank is showing a fourth-quarter profit of euro316 million ($418 million) after the bank cut costs and had fewer bad loans.

The result improves on profit of euro257 million in the same quarter a year ago.

And it's far better than the euro687 million loss recorded in the third quarter when the company had large writeoffs for Greek government bonds.

The Frankfurt-based bank reduced its operating costs to euro1.77 billion from euro2.16 billion a year earlier. Bad loans fell to euro381 million from euro595 million, The Associated Press reported.