Bank of India Q4 net loss widens to Rs 3,969 crore

State-run Bank of India today reported widening of its net loss to Rs 3,969 crore in the March quarter, on heavy provisioning for bad loans and treasury losses.

The bank had reported a net loss of Rs 1,046 crore in the same quarter last year.

"The decline in net profit was due to provisioning for bad debts as well as for treasury (MTM) losses," Bank of India managing director and chief executive officer Dinabandhu Mohapatra told reporters here.

For financial year 2017-18, the bank reported a net loss of Rs 6,044 crore, against a net loss of Rs 1,558 crore in the previous financial year.

Global net interest margin (NIM) stood at 1.65 per cent in the March quarter, against 2.39 per cent in the same quarter last year.

The lender's asset quality worsened as on March 31, 2018, with gross non-performing assets (NPAs) rising to 16.58 per cent of the gross advances, against 13.22 per cent by the end of March 2017. Net NPAs rose to 8.26 per cent, as against 6.90 per cent.

"We will try to achieve at least below-6 per cent net NPA for FY19," Mohapatra said.

The bank's exposure to NCLT 1 is around Rs 8,300 crore and NCLT 2 around Rs 3,000-3,300 crore.

Global fresh slippages in the fourth quarter of FY18 was Rs 12,973 crore, against Rs 6,915 in the corresponding quarter last fiscal.

It's global recovery stood at Rs 11,417 crore, compared with Rs 1,597.

The lender upgraded Rs 1,539 crore of loans (global), while wrote off Rs 1,938 crore of loans (global) during the March quarter.

Total deposits stood at Rs 52,0854 crore as on March 31, 2018, a decline of 3.55 per cent from the previous year. Gross advances were at Rs 37,5995 crore as on March 31, 2018, down by 4.52 per cent from last year.

The bank is also planning to monetise some of its non-core assets this financial year.

"We have tried to sell some of the non-core assets. But due to certain restrictions from the regulator and other stakeholders, it was delayed. However, now we have again started the process and I am quite hopeful that before the second quarter, some of the non-core assets would be sold," Mohapatra said.

He added that some of the real estate owned by the bank in domestic and international markets could be monetised for around Rs 1,000 crore.

Mohapatra said that the bank has rationalised some of the ATMs where there were low footfalls.

"After digitisation, footfall has come down in many ATMs. We have already closed 290 ATMs. We will continue to rationalise our ATMs wherever required," he said, adding that the lender has identified 25 loss-making branches, of which 15 have turned profitable and the bank is reviewing the rest.

It has also identified nine locations in the international market for rationalisation of branches, Mohapatra said.

The bank's scrip ended 4.71 per cent up at Rs 107.85 a piece on the BSE today, against 0.69 per cent rise in the benchmark.