Mumbai : State Bank of Travancore on Tuesday said its net profit for the March quarter fell 67.63% due to higher provisions.

Net profit for the quarter stood at Rs.62.14 crore as compared to Rs.191.97 crore a year ago.

Net interest income (NII) or the core income a bank earns by giving loans increased 8.6% to Rs.631.31 crore from Rs.581.40 crore last year. Other income increased to Rs.414.61 crore from Rs.371.59 crore in the same period last year, a rise of 11.58%.

Gross non-performing assets (NPAs) rose 35.76% to Rs.3,199.96 crore at the end of the March quarter from Rs.2,357.05 crore a year ago.

Provisions and contingencies jumped 217.34% to Rs.449.69 crore in the quarter from Rs.141.71 crore a year ago. The bank said its provision for NPAs jumped 464.3% from a year ago to Rs.520.32 crore.

In December, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) conducted an asset quality review across the banking sector, following which banks were asked to recognise visible stressed assets as N

PAs.

RBI also asked banks to make adequate provisions for these stressed assets over the third and fourth quarters of the current fiscal year. This could hit the profitability of some banks.

As a percentage of total loans, the bank’s gross NPAs stood at 4.78% at the end of the March quarter as compared to 3.87% in the previous quarter and 3.37% in the year-ago quarter.

Net NPAs were at 2.77% as compared to 2.45% in the previous quarter and 2.04% in the same quarter last year.

Advances for the quarter fell 4.74% to Rs.65,466.27 crore, while deposits rose 11.03% to Rs.1,01,118.80 crore.

The board approved a dividend of Rs.5 per share.

Shares of State Bank of Travancore closed 2.71% down at Rs.389.05 on BSE, while India’s benchmark Sensex rose 1.28% to 26,007.30 points.

Source : Sachin Murdeshwar