Good show by banks but can they sustain it?

Till March, banks could hold on but not all of them will be in a position to stomach the impact of the second wave of the pandemic

The earning season is over. 

It’s time to take a look at how the banks have fared in a year when Asia’s third-largest economy has shrunk 7.3 per cent. A year when the loan portfolio of the banking system grew just 5.6 per cent, its lowest since 1965 from when such data is available. A year when the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) imposed a moratorium on repayment of loans and allowed banks to restructure loans, and the government guaranteed a Rs 3 trillion emergency credit line to the troubled sectors.

The net profit of the listed Indian banks during the financial