Central Bank net profit jumps over 8-fold to Rs 192 crore

State-run Central Bank of India today reported over eight-fold rise in net profit to Rs 192 crore for the quarter ended June 30 on low base in the year-ago period when it had reported Rs 22 crore net profit.
"In the second quarter of the past fiscal, we had posted a big loss and thereafter we started correcting our strategies.
"Our endeavour has been paying off from the third quarter of last fiscal. In this quarter also, net profit has shown a continuous upward movement," the bank's CMD Rajeev Rishi told reporters here.
The city-based bank's net interest income grew 18.54 per cent to Rs 1,882 crore from Rs 1,537 crore a year ago.

Net interest margin, which is the difference between what it pays to depositors and what it earns from on-lending, improved to 2.87 per cent in the reporting quarter from 2.68 per cent earlier.
Rishi said for the current fiscal, the bank is targetting a net interest margin of 3 per cent.

However, gross non-performing assets in the quarter rose to 6.15 per cent from 6.03 per cent in the year ago period, but net NPAs declined a tad to 3.62 per cent from 3.85 per cent as the bank could recover Rs 208 crore.
"Although our gross NPAs marginally deteriorated to 6.15 per cent in the quarter, our net NPAs improved on recovery and we see this trend to continue going forward," Rishi said, adding that on a quarter-on-quarter basis, there was improvement in gross NPA levels when it stood at 6.27 per cent.

The bank plans to contain its gross NPAs at 5.61 per cent and net NPAs at 3.08 per cent in current fiscal, he added.
Fresh slippages in the quarter stood at Rs 1,800 crore, while upgrades stood at Rs 843 crore and recoveries at Rs 208 crore.
Total provisions and contingencies came down to Rs 782 crore from Rs 978 crore in the same quarter of last year. Provision coverage ratio improved to 51.52 per cent in the period from 42.46 per cent earlier.
The bank made a total provision of Rs 8 crore towards unhedged forex exposure in the quarter and for the full year it would be between Rs 35 crore and Rs 40 crore.

The total business rose 5.29 per cent to Rs 4,26,829 crore from Rs 4,05,383 crore last year. Deposits jumped 4.34 per cent to Rs 2,40,782 crore from Rs 2,30,760 crore, while total advances rose 6.54 per cent to Rs 1,86,047 crore from Rs 1,74,623 crore.
Retail loans grew 22.62 per cent to Rs 28,545 crore from Rs 23,280 crore in the same period last year.
The bank intends to grow its deposits by 14.47 per cent and advances by 10 per cent in this fiscal, the CMD added.