ICICI Bank shares soared over 9 per cent, driven by a five-fold jump in its March quarter net profit and the Cabinet nod for NPA resolution in the banking sector.
The stock ended higher by 9.24 per cent at Rs 297.95 on the BSE.
On the NSE, shares of the company zoomed 9.09 per cent to Rs 297.55.
The country's largest private sector lender ICICI Bank had yesterday reported a five-fold jump in its March quarter profit at Rs 2,082.75 crore, but the asset quality woes, which had dented its bottomline year-ago, continued to persist.
On a standalone basis, the net profit soared to Rs 2,024.64 crore from Rs 701.89 crore in the year-ago period but was down from Rs 2,441 crore in the December quarter.
Gross non-performing assets ratio shot up to 7.89 per cent from 5.21 per cent in the year-ago period and 7.20 per cent in the December quarter. Total provisions went down to Rs 2,898.22 crore from Rs 3,326.21 crore in the year-ago period and the provision coverage ratio dipped to 53.6 per cent from 61 per cent in the year-ago period.
The surge in the bank’s stock price was also on account of the government’s decision to bring an ordinance to empower the Reserve Bank to effectively deal with the problem of mounting bad loans in the banking sector.
A proposal to amend Section 35 A of the Banking Regulation Act through the ordinance route was approved by the Cabinet yesterday.