Bank of China (BoC) , the country's fourth-largest bank by assets, reported a 2.5% rise in fourth-quarter net profit to 54.4 billion yuan ($7.91 billion).

That earned 53.0 billion yuan a year earlier.

Profit for the full year increased 5.2% to 227.4 billion yuan, the lender said in a filing on Thursday, beating a Refinitiv estimate of 216.65 billion yuan from 14 analysts.

($1 = 6.8809 Chinese yuan renminbi) (Reporting by Ziyi Tang, Selena Li and Engen Tham; editing by Jason Neely)