Andhra Bank Q2 Net up over 2-fold; plans Rs 500 cr bond issue

Public sector lender Andhra Bank today said its net profit for the quarter ended September 30 rose by over two-fold on year-on-year basis to Rs 114.5 crore on account of higher interest income.
It reported Rs 70.7 crore net profit for the same quarter during the last fiscal, bank's chairman and managing director C V R Rajendran said today.
Total Income has increased to Rs 4,423.6 crore for the quarter under discussion against Rs 3,817.5 crore for the quarter ended September 30, 2013, he said.
"Considering the constraints we had at macro level, this is a better quarter. Problems in infrastructure, power and steel sector are yet to be sorted out fully. However, we see some improvement in the coming quarters," Rajendran told reporters at a press conference.

He said the bank aims to clock Rs 900 crore net profit for the whole year and is confident of achieving that.
On farm loan waiver schemes in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh governments, he said the bank started renewing loans in Telangana while it is yet to start in the neighbouring state. He, however, said the AP government had sought total details in order to pluck duplicate loans.

"All the banks are in the process of submitting the details. Over 90 per cent of the details have been submitted. The rest will be done soon," he said.
Rajendran said the bank's exposure to Visakhapatnam will be around Rs 5,000 crore and the recent cyclone Hudhud may force some loan-rescheduling there.

Replying to a query, he said the capital requirement for the current financial year is projected at Rs 800 crore and the bank has requested the government to provide the same.
"In the meantime we are planning to raise tier-I bonds. There is a plan to raise Rs 500 crore plus Rs 500 crore Tier-I bonds (Rs 500 crore under Greenshoe option).
If that goes well there will not be any need for capital infusion. We may be able to manage even without government's capital infusion," he said, adding that the bonds may be launched in December.
He said as per indications, the government may allocate about Rs 200 crore to Rs 300 crore from the Rs 11,600 crore provided in the budget earlier.

The gross non-performing assets (NPAs) or bad loans of the banks were up at 5.99 per cent of the total advances during the quarter under review, from 5.15 per cent year earlier.
Net NPAs stood at 3.86 per cent in the second quarter of current fiscal, up from 3.54 per cent in the same quarter year ago.