Allahabad Bank to trim NPAs to 3.2%

The bank which is monitoring bad accounts on a daily basis aims to recover Rs 3,000 crore

Public sector lender Allahabad Bank aims to bring down its gross non-performing assets (NPAs) level to around 3.2% from the last fiscal's level of 3.92% on the back of sustained effort on recovery, a top bank official has said.

"As far as asset quality is concerned, we aim to bring down our gross NPAs to around 3.2% by end of this fiscal from 3.92% in FY13," chairman and managing director Shubhalakshmi Panse told PTI over the weekend.

She also said the bank is monitoring bad accounts on a daily basis along with focus on recovery.

"We aim to recover Rs 2,800-3,000 crore in the current fiscal from Rs 2,300 crore done last fiscal," Panse said.

The bank chief also said the possibility of upgrade of accounts would be more with economic growth.

Last week, Allahabad Bank had reported a 68.5% decline in net profit at Rs 126.15 crore in the fourth quarter of last fiscal on account of rise in bad loans.

Referring to the cost of funds for the bank, Panse said with repricing of bulk deposits, it had already come down in Q4 and is likely to go down further.

She also said the growth of low cost deposit (Casa) is good for the bank and it hopes to sustain it in the current financial year.

The bank had a Casa (current account, savings account) ratio of around 31% by end of the past fiscal. Panse, however, said it has little room for reduction in lending rates as it had already done so in February and its current lending rates are competitive.

On the issue of growth in loan book, she said while corporate loan book will see good growth, the bank wants to increase its retail assets.

"We aim to increase our retail loan book to 15% from present 13.5%," Panse said.