Moneycontrol Bureau
Punjab National Bank (PNB) disappointed street on Friday with the fourth quarter profit falling 61.9 percent year-on-year to Rs 307 crore. Higher provisions, flat operating profit and lower net interest income dented the bottomline that got support from other income and tax gains.
Net interest income, the difference between interest earned and interest expended, fell by 5.3 percent to Rs 3,791 crore for the quarter ended March compared to Rs 4,002 crore in the year-ago period, impacted by lower credit growth and NPA.
Profit was estimated at Rs 873 crore and net interest income at Rs 4,322 for the quarter, according to a CNBC-TV18 poll.
Other income (non-interest income) surged 29.2 percent year-on-year to Rs 1,805.13 crore, aided by trading profit (of Rs 538 crore) and recoveries. Operating profit increased by 0.92 percent to Rs 3,202.7 crore in fourth quarter.
Provisions for bad loans shot up 79.2 percent (up 161 percent sequentially) to Rs 3,834 crore during January-March quarter compared to Rs 2,139 crore in the year-ago period with provisioning coverage ratio at 58.21 percent as on March 31.
Asset quality deteriorated during January-March quarter with the gross non-performing assets (NPA) climbing 6.55 percent compared to 5.97 percent in December quarter and 5.25 percent in corresponding quarter of last fiscal. Net NPA rose by 121 basis points year-on-year (up 24 basis points sequentially) to 4.06 percent in the quarter gone by.
In absolute term, gross NPA climbed 36 percent Y-o-Y (up 15.7 percent Q-o-Q) to Rs 25,695 crore and net NPA jumped 55.2 percent year-on-year (up 11.7 percent quarter-on-quarter) to Rs 15,396 crore in the quarter ended March 2015.
The public sector lender reported a tax gain of Rs 938 crore during January-March quarter against tax expenses of Rs 228.4 crore in the same quarter last year.
At 13:02 hours IST, the scrip of Punjab National Bank was quoting at Rs 146.40, down Rs 9.75, or 6.24 percent on the BSE.
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