State-run Central Bank of India on Thursday posted a 26 per cent jump in its net profit for the quarter ended June 30 to Rs 337 crore as compared to Rs 267-crore in the same period last year, helped by healthy growth in loans, despite lower trading gains.
Net interest income growth was 93.76 per cent with loan growth of 23.12 per cent. According to Chairman and Managing Director S Sridhar, the full impact of shedding high cost deposits of around Rs 20,000 in the fourth quarter was felt in the first quarter which has helped net interest income to zoom.
However, trading gains were lower at Rs 60 crore as compared with Rs 271 crore during the reporting period, due to hardening of bond yields.
The lender, however, witnessed sharp increase in its non-performing assets during the quarter mainly on account of loan turning non-performing from one large corporate account, which amounted to around Rs 100-crore, Sridhar said.
The bank had fresh additions of around Rs 289-crore bad loans in the first quarter as against Rs 71 crore in the year-ago period. Net non-performing assets of the bank went up to 0.77 per cent as compared to 0.70 per cent in the same quarter last year.
Central Bank has approached the government to raise around Rs 2,500-crore in the current financial year and is currently in dialogues with the government to decide the appropriate modality to raise this amount, Sridhar said.
“We are in dialogues with the government to discuss the appropriate model to raise this capital, as we have to raise Rs 2,500-crore in 2010-11 itself to maintain a Tier-I capital adequacy of 8 per cent,” Sridhar told reporters here.
