Led by a steady increase in income, private sector lender HDFC Bank on Saturday reported a 20.31 per cent rise in its net profit at Rs 5,585.9 crore for the quarter ended December 31, 2018.

The bank, which is the largest private sector lender, had a net profit of Rs 4,642.60 crore in the third quarter in the last fiscal.

The bank’s total income for the October to December 2018 quarter grew by 26 per cent to Rs 30,811.3 crore from Rs 24,450.4 crore in the same period a year ago.

Net interest income (interest earned less interest expended) for the quarter ended December 31, 2018 grew by 21.9 per cent to Rs 12,576.8 crore as compared to Rs 10,314.3 crore in the same period a year ago. “This was driven by asset growth of 23.7 per cent and a core net interest margin for the quarter of 4.3 per cent,” HDFC Bank said in a release.

Other income or non-interest revenue also grew by a robust 27.2 per cent to Rs 4,921.0 crore in the third quarter of the fiscal, compared to Rs 3,869.2 crore in the corresponding quarter ended December 31, 2017.

Asset quality remained stable and gross NPAs were marginally higher at 1.38 per cent of gross assets as on December 31, 2018, as against 1.29 per cent a year ago. Net NPAs amounted to 0.42 per cent of net advances as on December 31, 2018, compared to 0.44 per cent a year ago.

The bank’s provisions for the quarter ended December 31, 2018 were Rs 2,211.5 crore (consisting of specific loan loss provision of Rs 1,734.6 crore and general and other provisions of Rs 476.9 crore) as against Rs 1,351.4 crore for the quarter ended December 31, 2017.

Provisions for the third quarter this fiscal included a charge of Rs 322.4 crore towards contingent provisions.

“There was no divergence observed by RBI for the financial year ended March 31, 2018 in respect of the bank's asset classification and provisioning under the extant prudential norms on income recognition, asset classification and provisioning pertaining to advances,” HDFC Bank said in a regulatory filing.

Total advances as of December 31, 2018 were Rs 780,951 crore. Domestic advances grew by 24.1 per cent over December 31, 2017. Total deposits as of December 31, 2018 were Rs 852,502 crore, registering an increase of 22 per cent over December 31, 2017.

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