Kanakamahalakshmi co-op bank profit up 80%

Visakhapatnam-based Kanakamahalakshmi Cooperative Bank registered 80 per cent growth in gross profits during 2006-07 at Rs 120.62 lakh, compared with Rs 67 lakh in the last fiscal.

The bank will announce a 15 per cent dividend to the shareholders as against 12 per cent in the previous year, P Raghunadha Rao, chairman, told mediapersons.

During the fiscal 2006-07, the bank mobilised new deposits worth Rs 5.65 crore. Its total deposits stood at Rs 33.02 crore by the end of March 31, 2007. Rao said the bank was targeting to touch Rs 40 crore by the end of this fiscal.

It recently increased its interest rates on deposits. The 5-year term deposits now gets 10.50 per cent interest while for senior citizens it's one 1 per cent extra.

"We are planning to increase the rates again in the coming days, and therefore, expect more than Rs 7 crore new deposits during this fiscal," he said.

The bank is also planning to introduce new services like SMS banking and customer balance enquiry terminal soon, he added. Besides, it would open two more branches in the city. "We are awaiting RBI's nod in this regard. The first branch would come up at Gopalapatnam," he said.