ICICI profit up 42% on robust offtake

2005

2006

% chg

Interest earned3712.485824.6556.89 Other income1179.171980.5967.96 Total income4891.657805.2459.56 Total expenses3697.165829.157.66 Operating profit1194.491976.1465.44 Net profit640.08910.0842.18 CAR (%)14.5313.37

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 The bank's total provisioning was up 125.51 per cent to Rs 890.95 crore in the quarter ended December 2006 from Rs 395.07 year earlier.  The bank's provisioning for consumer and commercial banking rose more than two-fold (260 per cent) to Rs 612.70 crore in the third quarter from Rs 170.13 crore a year earlier, also because of a rise in non-performing assets (NPAs).  The bank's net NPAs rose marginally to 1 per cent as on December 31, 2006.The bank also had to provide Rs 85 crore for potential losses from frauds in loans to farmers against warehouse receipts at 20-25 per cent margins.  The bank said it will proceed against the borrower farmers for recovery of the loans of about Rs 120 crore.  The provisioning for investment banking rose marginally to Rs 278.25 crore from Rs 224.94 crore in the same quarter last year.  As a result of higher provisioning, the contribution of consumer and commercial banking to ICICI Bank's profit before tax dropped nearly 9 per cent to Rs 713.13 crore in the third quarter of 2006-07 from Rs 784.35 crore in the same quarter last year.  The profit before tax from investment banking was up nearly fifteen-fold (1447 per cent) to Rs 381.66 crore from Rs 24.67 crore in the corresponding quarter last year.  The bank's fee income more than compensated the drop in retail banking's contribution profits. Its fee income rose 53 per cent to Rs 1,345 crore in the third quarter ended December 31, 2006.  The net interest margin fell to 2.6 per cent at the end of December 2006, from 2.9 per cent a year earlier, as on rising cost of funds. ICICI, which has already raised $4 billion of debt in the current financial year, saw its borrowings rise 60 per cent to Rs 47,629 crore in the December 2006 quarter.