SBI clocks 17% credit growth in Q3

The country’s largest lender, State Bank of India (SBI), has posted about 17 per cent year-on-year (y-o-y) growth in credit till December 2012, with substantial business coming from the retail segment.

While the retail category — home and automobile — loans have shown good growth, corporate credit is also showing sign of revival, Chairman Pratip Chaudhuri said.

The bank has shown 17.8 per cent y-o-y growth in credit till September 2012. The total loan book was Rs 9,56,000 crore at the end of September. The retail segment showed 13.6 per cent growth, with loan dues of Rs 1,91,760 crore at the end of September.

The bank has cleared fresh term loans to some companies in the steel and oil sectors, Chaudhuri said. SBI’s large corporate loans grew y-o-y by 27 per cent to Rs 1,45,770 crore till the end of September.

Analysts said there might not be any immediate change in the demand pattern (corporate credit) in the current phase of the economic slowdown. Much of the growth in corporate loans was driven by working capital requirements, till date in the current financial year (FY13). There could be some change in the economic environment, giving a nudge to project and infrastructure loan demand.

Referring to the trend of slippages (standard loans becoming non-performing assets, or NPAs), the SBI chief said the situation was stabilising and the worst phase was over.

SBI had seen its NPAs grow to Rs 49,202 crore (5.15 per cent) at the end of September 2012, from Rs 39,676 crore (4.4 per cent) at the end of March 2012. Its provision coverage ratio for NPAs has dipped to 62.78 per cent in September 2012, from 68.10 per cent in March 2012.

The PCR was 62.52 per cent in December 2011.