(CHARLOTTE) -- Bank of America Corporation reported third quarter net income of $6.2 billion, or $0.56 per diluted share. This compared to a net loss of $7.3 billion, or $0.77 per diluted share during the same period of 2010.

“This quarter’s results reflect several actions we took that highlight our ongoing transformation toward becoming a leaner, more focused company,” said Chief Executive Officer Brian Moynihan. “The diversity and depth in our customer and client offerings provided some resiliency in a very challenging environment.”

In a statement released on Tuesday the Charlotte-based bank offered some perspective for the drastic improvement in it year-over-year quarterly report. This most recent quarter was positively impacted by a pretax gain of $3.6 billion from the sale of shares of China Construction Bank, $1.7 billion pretax gain in trading Debit Valuation Adjustments.  The third quarter of 2010 also included a $10.4 billion goodwill impairment charge.

“Our focus this quarter was on strengthening the balance sheet by selling non-core assets and building capital to position the company for future growth,” said Chief Financial Officer Bruce Thompson.

BofA reduced the size of its balance sheet by $42 billion when compared to the second quarter of 2011. "The bank...continued to have strong liquidity levels even after significantly reducing both short- and long-term debt,” added Thompson.