Andhra Bank Q4 Net declines 32% at Rs 35 cr as bad loans spike

Public sector Andhra Bank has registered a decline of 32 per cent in net profit at Rs 35.13 crore for the last quarter ended March 2017 on rise in bad loans.
The bank had posted a net profit of Rs 51.60 crore in the corresponding quarter of preceding fiscal.
However, income during the quarter increased to Rs 5,424.70 crore from Rs 5,124.37 crore in the corresponding period year ago, it said in a BSE filing.
Interest income rose to Rs 4,774.09 crore during January-March quarter from Rs 4,651.53 crore year ago.
Bank's provisioning to cover bad loans were hiked to Rs 1,299.33 crore for March quarter on higher ratio of bad assets, from Rs 1,022.59 crore year earlier.

"In compliance with RBI directives on asset quality review of advance, bank has kept incremental provision against standard advances of Rs 376.57 crore (during the quarter March 2017 Rs 74.94 crore)," it said in a regulatory filing.

Gross non-performing assets (NPAs) as of March-end 2017 hit 12.25 per cent as a percentage of gross loans, from 8.39 per cent year ago. Net NPAs or bad loans were of the order of 7.57 per cent, up from 4.61 per cent.
For the full year, net profit of the bank also fell to Rs 174.34 crore from Rs 539.84 crore in 2015-16. Total income during the year was up at Rs 20,335.73 crore from Rs 19,199.16 crore in the year-ago fiscal.

Andhra Bank said no dividend is proposed for 2016-17.
Stock of the bank closed 2.84 per cent higher at Rs 70.70 on BSE.